


Rough Around the Edges

by dangsu



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Small Town, Alternate Universe - Teenagers, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:40:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 33
Words: 44,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23236369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dangsu/pseuds/dangsu
Summary: Mikey and his crew of friends are used to getting the occasional dirty look or detentions. It's only when Mikey agrees to help Bert McCracken with his side hustle and an annoying kid from Chicago moves into town that things start getting harder.
Relationships: Frank Iero/Gerard Way, Frank Iero/Jamia Nestor, Mikey Way/Pete Wentz
Comments: 56
Kudos: 27





	1. Cigarettes and Switchblades

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, I hope everyone is doing well. I have alot planned for this, so I hope you like it. Also, this chapter is flashbacks, the real stuff is next chapter!

1993

“Gabe, shut up”, Mikey said. He stopped twirling his straw in the school milk and squinted his eyes. He mentallly kicked himself for forgetting his glasses again. He could have used them as he attempted to watch the shaggy haired kid walk around the cafeteria and eventually end up in their area. Gabe huffed, he didn’t like being interrupted.

“Mind if I sit here?”, the shaggy haired kid asked. Mikey could see him now that he was close up. He had buggy large eyes and a drawn out nose. He also had a bruised lip that made him look a little like a puffer fish. The kid was short and tanned like he went outside a lot.

“Sure, it’s your own death”, Gabe responded while scooting over. His curly hair flooded as he made space for the kid. This was about two years before Gabe discovered the wonders of a straightening iron and four years before he gave a shit about his hair. 

“Thanks”, the kid smiled warmly.

“You new or somthin’?”, Mikey asked. He leaned in a little on the table, anticipating an answer.

“Oh yeah”, the kid nodded exuberantly. “I’m from the Chatlioc school down the street. St John's.” The kid pushed his hair out of his face. “I’m Frank by the way”. He leaned in to stick his hand out, expecting to shake Mikey’s hand. Instead, he accidently stepped on Pete. 

“Shit”, Pete cursed before crawling out from under the table. He was hiding from the lunch admin, trying to smoke under the table. Mikey took the cigarette from Pete’s hand as Pete slid back on the seat. 

“Don’t mind him. He’s Pete”, Mikey motioned to Pete. “That’s Gabe”, he motioned to Gabe who waved. “I’m Mikey Way”. He took a drag from Pete’s cigarette and put it out as he saw the school admin walk by. Gabe pouted. Cigarettes were hard to come by in middle school. It was law that if one were to smoke one, all three boys got at least a drag before putting it out. 

“Admin”, Mikey explained.

Gabe nodded in understanding. Mikey threw him the but, which was only half smoked, and Gabe lit it up. “Why did you transfer here in the middle of October? Do your parents hate you or something?”.

The Frank kid nodded his head. He looked down at his lunch tray and frowned. The school lunch at private schools must have looked a lot tastier. He cautiously took a madirin orange cup and picked one of the shriveled orange slices. “No. My mom loves me alright. Well, at least she used to before Saint John’s kicked me out”.

“You got kicked out?”, Gabe gawked. He looked impressed. It was hard to impress Gabe Saporta. He would occasionally nod approvingly or tilt his head and go ‘hmm’, but he hardly was impressed.

“Yeah… I didn’t mean to.”

“Whatchu do?”, Pete asked.

“Nothing. I just got in a fight. Chatlioc school guys are dicks. They kept on shoving me into lockers and calling me a fag couse of my hair. I got tired of it.” Frank picked at his oranges some more but with more confidence. “This one guy said something and I just punched him. That’s all. Ain’t nothing to it”.

“That’s cool kid. Your hair is tough by the way”, Gabe said nodding his head. “It’s a little rough-around-the-edges, ya know?”

Frank smiled at Gabe. Mikey knew that they’d be seeing Frank alot from now on. If Gabe liked you, you were golden. 

“Thanks”.

“How old are you?”, Pete questioned. Pete was the questioner. He was always curious and asked good questions although he never needed an answer. He’d interrogate you like a cop, making you almost wet yourself from fear, before laughing it off. 

“I turn twelve on Halloween”.

“Damn, you are eleven?”, Pete continued. Everyone seems young to Pete since he failed a grade. He was fourteen and had been for a few months. Gabe just turned fourteen on the 11th and Mikey was thirteen.

“Well, yeah. For seven more days” , the Frank kid said like ‘duh’. Of course he was eleven!

“Let the kid be elleven damn it!”, Gabe exclaimed, all dramatic. He even threw his arms in the air. Pete rolled his eyes. Gabe stuck his tongue out before turning back to Frank. “Elleven is cool'', Gabe reassured. Frank couldn’t see it, but Mikey could totally see how Gabe was babying Frank. Frank was going to be a Mascot. “Elleven is real tough”, Gabe continued. He passed the cigarette to Frank who accepted it questioningly.

“These things give you cancer”. Frank gave the thing a look before pulling it to his lips. He inhaled and exhaled without coughing. 

______________________________________________________________________________

May 1996

“I know you understand why you were called into the office”. The principal, Mr.Dever, walked around his desk, giving the boys dirty looks that Mikey was well acquainted with. The jumpy rebel-with-out-a-cause middle schoolers had blossomed into deviant thrill seeking highschoolers. The evolution was flawless.

Mikey saw Gabe rolled his eyes. The principal had lined up four chairs in front of his desk. He sat down at his desk and folded his hands. Mikey was sitting next to Pete and Gabe with Frank on Gabe’s left. 

“Don’t you roll your eyes at me, boy”, Principal Dever snapped. He pointed his finger at Gabe and waved it in a circle accusatory.

Gabe sat up straight but still looked extremely disinterested and disrespectful. Pete yawned and drooped his head onto Mikey’s shoulder, which wasn’t too hard since Mikey’s shoulder reached Pete’s chin. His dreads tickled Mikey’s neck and Pete made it worse by licking Mikey’s neck, making Mikey jump a bit and causing Gabe to laugh.

Principal Dever grew red in the face. “What exactly do you think you are doing?!”, he screamed. He took a deep breath and seemed to collect himself. Just a little. Pete grinned into Mikey’s neck and slid Mikey’s glasses off to play with them.

Gabe shook his head annoyed and scooted his chair a few inches forward. He hunched his shoulders and intertwined his fingers. He then proceeded to stare Dever straight in the eyes. Like a fucking hawk. 

“Look, we’re all smart kids. Well, I am at least. My GPA can show you that. I know we messed up. We shouldn’t have fought those kids because, yes, I know, they play football and have college scholarships lined up for them. And we know we were totally in the wrong. Sure, some football players were shoving a kid who’s like 5’4 in a locker and yeah they gave him a black eyed and roughed him up. But that doesn’t mean we should have tried to fight them. We should have just watched them be dicks, no not just dicks, assault our friend. We should have just sat and watched! Because that would have turned out so great! Frank mighta been really fucked up by the time a teacher broke them up. But why should we have done anything? Huh? We shoulda just watched, ya know. Watch these two pea-brain jocks beat up our friend. Why was Frank even called to the office? He didn't even do anything. Those guys are bullies and they got to walk away free! Frank didn’t do anything ‘cept get beat up and he’s getting in trouble? That, Principal Dever is fucking bullshit”. Gabe scouted his chair back and crossed his arms. He looked real intimidating being 6’4 and all.

Principal Dever looked angry. More angry than Ms.Way when Mikey broke her favorite porcelain doll or when Gerard came home drunk in highschool. He was really angry. 

“Mr. Iero, you may report back to class or stop by the nurses if you need ice”, Principal Dever seethed. Frank nodded and fucked off real quick. 

“Now for the rest of you”, Dever started, looking around at his catch. “You are suspended for three days. For fighting.”

Gabe’s eyes light up with flames. “Why are we suspended but the kids beating on Frank aren’t?”, he demanded.

“Those kids were attacked by you all, that’s why. It was a two to three fight which if I’m not mistaken, you Mr. Wentz, started by jumping on one of the students back. That is why you are all suspended, for initiating a fight. They didn’t do anything. Plus, they have scholarships lined up. They can’t get in trouble”.

“But they are bullying Frank”, Pete interjected. “The short kid”, he clarified. “They were trying to shove him in another locker! I wouldn’t have done anything if those kids weren’t picking on my buddy”.

Dever shook his head. His shiny bald head glistened in from the light coming out of the adjacent window. The wrinkles on his forehead started to increase. “There is nothing wrong with a little teasing. It’s how boys become men”. 

Principal Dever wrote up some papers and went to the office phone. He went through the telephone books and searched for each boy’s parental contact information. Dever made the boys sit in the office silently while he called their parents. Pete started nuzzling his head into Mikey’s neck, making Mikey shudder. Dever shot the two dirty looks every now and then while searching the phone book.

He called everybody’s mom and dad, with the exception of Mikey’s dad since his Ms.Way didn’t put his name on school paperwork anymore after he fucked off a hundred miles south and took up drinking. The Way family was littered with alcoholics on both sides. The Ways still saw their father on holidays and every other month, but there was no reason for him to be called.

Pete’s mom was the first to come pick up her child. She walked into the office with her arms crossed and nostrils flared. She meant business. She apologized to Principal Dever before dragging Pete out by his ear. “Let’s go Pete”, she commanded.

Pete winced and screamed “Ahhh, mom stop! That hurts my ear”, to which Pete’s mom slapped him in the face. 

“I’ll drag you buy your dreads then?”, she sarcastically asked. She seemed more annoyed than mad, but Pete still shut up good and left. 

Twenty minutes later, Gabe’s mother came into the office. She shook her head at Gabe and signed whatever papers Dever pointed at. Gabe got antsy watching his mom fill out papers and squirmed around. He tried talking to her, “Mama, lo siento”.

Mrs. Saporta rolled her eyes. She turned from the last paper she was signing. “No hables”, she responded curtly. Gabe sunk into the chair accepting defeat. “Vos no lo sientes”, she murmured while shaking her head. Gabe kind of chuckled and turned to Mikey. 

“She says I’m not actually sorry”, he whispered kind of amused.

“You don’t look sorry with that big smirk on your face”, Mikey told Gabe.

Gabe shrugged. “I’ll see you in three days if my mom doesn’t kill me”. Gabe winked and stood up as his mom walked out the office. He blew a kiss to Mikey and waved to Dever. “Bye Bye, Dever”.

Dever sighed. He put his pen back in his pencil cup. He was only forty, but he looked to be about sixty right now. “I don’t get paid enough for this”, he huffed. He turned on his chair and looked at Mikey. “You’re the only one who’s kept quiet. You seem like a good kid, don’t get involved with those kids. You probably think they are popular or…. Cool”, he waved his arms in the air, “but this behavior is not cool. Don’t get involved with those kids”.

Mikey grinned sheepishly and looked down. He laughed to himself thinking that it was a little too late. Mikey was already involved with ‘those kids’. Sometimes he resented the fact that he was always the good one in the group. He was quiet and tended to his own. But it only bothered him sometimes. He could be just as much as an asshole as Gabe or Pete any given day if he wanted to.

“It’s too late for that.”, Mikey laughed lightly while habitually rubbing his temple. He then winced as pain surged and he remembers getting punched there. His mom would probably throw a bag of frozen peas on it since there weren’t any ice bags at the Way’s. 

Dever raised his eyebrows. “Kidm it’s never too late to-”

“No, I mean like I’m already… whatever. It doesn’t matter”. Mikey slouched into the chair wishing his mom would just hurry up and come. She wouldn’t be that pissed, just annoyed that she had left work early. She knew that Frank got picked on alot, she'd probably be happy that Frank was getting justice.

“Listen kid, I’m just saying, you seem a little rough around the edges, but you aren’t a pain like those other boys. Just behave”, Dever said while stacking papers. “You one suspension won’t hurt your chances at a future. Colleges don’t mind if it’s a one time thing. I’ve seen your grades. A 3.2 is pretty good”. 

Mikey shrugged. He didn’t know why Dever was talking to Mikey about having a future. Mikey didn’t do jack shit. He only really cared about music, movies, and comics. He might have cared about weed a little bit, but not as much as Frank. Mikey wasn’t very ambitious when it came to school, he forgot to do his homework a lot and if it wasn’t for the one honors class he took, he wouldn’t make the honor roll. He knew that Gabe had a better GPA, it was like a 3.8 or something obnoxiously high like that. Frank had a fucking 4.0 and was practiacly scholarship bound if he didn’t screw around too much. 

“Yeah, okay”.

___________

“What did he even say to you after we left?”, Gabe asked,

Mikey and Gabe had met up at the local playground between Mikey’s neighborhood and the apartment complexes. Gabe was sitting on top of the slide smoking a cigarette and trying to rub a stain out his white shirt. Mikey sat a step down from Gabe and leaned back on the playground pole. They figured if they were gonna be suspended, might as well hangout. Pete couldn’t make it as he was grounded and his mom was driving back on her breaks to make sure he was there.

“I don’t know. He said something about me being rough around the edges but I still seemed like a good kid. I don’t know”, Mikey squinted at the distance. He thought he saw some dudes with slicked hair and sleeveless shirts in the distance talking and milling about. “We should go, Gabe”, Mikey said. Guys like that were bad news. Gabe nodded in understanding and slid down the slide like a little kid. 

“You know, I should start carrying a knife around. This gang bullshit is getting ridiculous. They’re fucking everywhere!”, Gabe exclaimed once they were far away from the playground and making their way to Gabe’s apartment.

“That is the dumbest bull shit I have ever heard. And that’s coming from me”. Mikey laughed at the image of Gabe carrying a blade. “That’s fucking stupid. Just don’t get involved with people in gangs”. 

Gabe laughed a little to, relizing how stupid it was. “It could come in handy though”, he laughed a little more. 

“You’re like 6’4. You could beat up anyone. You don’t need a fucking knife. If anything I need a fucking knife”.

“Nah, we’re fine. As long as you don’t get in with it with a guy who’s like… six foot, you’ll be good. You got muscular arms for some reason. Also everyone is like 5’8 around here. You Itallians are short fuckers. You’ll be fine. It’s Frank and Pete we have to worry about”, Gabe laughed.

“They’d be so screwed”, Mikey agreed.

“We should start a protection program for them. I call president!”.

“You’re so dumb, Saporta”.


	2. Como La Flor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pete comes back from Chicago with some interesting News.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BRUUUUH, corona virus is fucking my shit UP. I actually miss going to school and shit. Seeing people and whatnot. It's fun to skip class but it's not fun for class to skip you, you know? Also, I love Selena Quintinalla!
> 
> Here is some background information/ fun facts for this chapter:
> 
> *Phat Farm- A popular brand of clothing that alot of hip-hop artists wore
> 
> *Selena Quintanilla- She was a very popular Mexican American artists who was shot dead in 1995, which was a huge tragedy amoung the Latin community.
> 
> *Through out highschool, Pete Wentz had dread locks
> 
> *Gabe Saporta's first music love was hip-hop
> 
> *In Rioplatense Spanish (Spanish Spoken in Argentina and Uruguay) the "ll" sound normally pronounced as 'ie'/'y' is commonly pronounced as a 'sh' due to Itallian influence
> 
> Thank You and Enjoy!

_ 1997 _

“Do you think Pete misses eating normal Pizza?”.

Mikey turned to look at Gabe funny. Frank was already looking at Gabe funny from the backseat. 

“What are you saying, Saporta?”, Frank asked. He sounded apprehensive. Mikey figures it was because half the time when you asked Gabe Saporta to elaborate something, you were going to get a load of bullshit. The other half you got insightful wisdom or useful information. It really was a flip of the coin.

Gabe sighed all ‘why-don’t-you-get-it’, like he was an exasperated twelve year old girl instead of a jack-ass seventeen-going-on-eighteen year old. The morning sun caused him to squint and he looked real funny as he sped through stop signs and dogged other cars like it was frogger. Mikey secretly hoped he didn’t crash. Although he couldn’t get his hopes up, Gabe was a shit driver but Mikey was worse.

“Pete. He's been in Chicago for like three months”, Gabe continued. Mikey could practically hear the ‘duh’ dripping from Gabe’s voice. Gabe had that about him, he was kind of an asshole but it suited him.

“Yeah”, Frank continued. “And?”

“And they eat Pizza like a fucking brick in Chicago. You could knock somebody out with it”.

Mikey saw Frank roll his eyes from the back seat. Frank opened his mouth to say something to piss Gabe off before Mikey spoke.

“Maybe he likes his Pizza like that. He’s from there, he probably thinks our Pizza is shit”, Mikey offered thoughtfully.

“What ever, Mikeyway. I’ll just ask him when we see him. Look there he is''. Gabe pulled up to Pete’s house. Pete was coming out of his home when he saw Gabe’s nasty truck and his eyes lit up as he approached the car. He ran through his primed lawn towards the truck. Frank chuckled as Pete tripped and slid across the grass, getting his cargo shorts muddy and ripping a chunk of the grass out.

His mother was standing in the doorway, yelling about how the lawn was just getting treated while shaking her head. Pete was the only person Mikey knew whose parents actually hired a company to do their lawn. Hell, Pete was the only person Mikey knew that had a single family house. Well, technically Frank lived in a single family house with his mom, but it was small and looked shitter than anything with a rusty iron fence and stray dogs running around. Pete lived in a nicer neighborhood about ten minutes from where Mikey lived. He lived in a two story home that was complete with a lawn and garden. Mikey lived in a townhouse that used to be one big house but was split up into two or three subdivisions and Gabe lived in the same apartment complex that Ray did except Gabe had to share a room with one brother instead of two.

Pete had spent his summer in Chicago with his Aunt from his mom’s side. Pete was originally from there and moved when he was twelve. Mikey was a little upset that Pete wouldn’t be spending the summer before senior year with them, like they had planned back when Frank was a freshman. They were gonna like terrorize their town, leave their mark or whatever before going to college or leading dead end lives. But when he saw Pete grin with a plan ticket in hand, he knew he’d get over it. Mikey and Pete had an odd friendship. They’d pick on eachother and laugh at each other but share secret smiles and talk about deep things. Sometimes they’d go on Mikey’s roof and talk all night. Pete made Mikey goofy, and Mikey Way was not a goofy person. They’d also cuddle and hug each other. Sometimes they kissed, but it was only ever to freak people out, mostly old white ladies. They weren’t a thing or anything. They were just weird boys.

“What is up, Wentz?”, Gabe drew as Pete opened the backdoor. He hadn’t changed at all. He still was short, energetic, and smiling. He did cut his dreads from shoulder length to much shorter. He also bleached the tips frosty. Mikey though he looked like a spiky cotton ball. 

Pete grinned. “Oh man, you guys there is a lot up. I really missed you all while I was in Chicago. My Aunt said you all could visit, but I figured you all’d be busy. Anyways, the music scene there is dope! It’s amazing! I went to a show like every weekend. And guess who I bumped into? Patrick! I know you’ve never met him, but you all know how much I talk about that kid. It was really nice to catch up with him! The last I saw him… he was like… twelve. He’s in highschool now. And guess what? He was really upset cause the kids were being dicks to him at his middle school and he was also upset because his dad got a job around here and he had to move and he was pissed cause he had like one friend there and was sad he was leaving them but guess what?”

“What Pete?” they all answered, feeding into Pete’s excitement.

“Patrick is moving here! I couldn’t believe it! I mean, I know that the company our dads worked for were trying to front a new site around here, I mean that’s why I moved here, but I didn’t know that he was moving here! Oh my god! I can’t wait to show him to you guys. You’re gonna love him! I’m excited. Also guess what? I slept with 5 girls in Chicago, that brings my body count to like 10, which is higher than average for a highschooler and definitely higher than any of you virgins”.

“Pete, Frank’s the only virgi-”

“Shut up, Gabe!”

“What ever, you are all virgins compared to my 10 girls!”, Pete grinned. God, that kid did not shut up.

Mike rolled his eyes. Leave it to Pete to be concerned with body count. “Pete, you’re acting like girls are objects to be collected. Girls are not fucking Pokemon cards. God, am I the only one who was raised right?”. Mikey shook his head.

“Hey, I was raised real well. I actually take my girls on dates before hooking up, Mikeyway. And I prefer to give them roses instead of STDs, Pete”, Gabe interjected. He lit up a cigarette and blew the smoke from his nose. Frank just sulked in the corner of the truck. “Oh and don’t worry, Frank, you'll find somebody. Jamia has been making googly eyes at you since July.”

“Shut up Gabe”.

“What it’s true”-

“Both of you shut up and let me finish my story before we get to school”, Pete interrupted. “Anyways, they were really hot. There was this one girl, her name was Stacy. I met her at this band gig. I went with Patrick cause he wanted to show me the scene and whatever. And then I saw here, she was dancing like an angel. I actually talked to her and we… ya know. And then the second girl was named Abigail. She was this punk chick, real hot. So we also met at a show. She was really drunk and puked on my shoes. I was a gentleman of course and helped clean her up. I also gave her my number… We hooked up a few times on and off, you know. Then there was this other girl her name was Travy and”... Mikey driftet off in the front seat. He felt a weird twinge in his chest everytime Pete mentioned another girl's name, so he decided to stop listening.

What semt like fifty years later, Gabe cleared his throat.

“Hey Pete, do you eat Pizza there?”, Gabe asked, completely interrupting Pete’s blabbering. Mikey and Frank looked at each other and snickered. Mikey turned to see Pete. He looked completely confused, causing them to snicker more.

“Well… yeah”.

“Did the pizza there taste like shit or does our pizza taste like shit?”, Gabe continued slyly. 

“Well, I guess I like the Pizza back home better. Pizza here is kind of shitty”, Pete answered dumbfounded. People didn’t usually interrupt Pete.

“Pete, get out of my car”.

Pete looked around. His eyebrows were raised and he turned to Frank and Mikey looking for answers. Frank giggled like a little girl. He had a weird laugh due to him constantly being high. Mikey just grinned a little. He knew what Gabe was doing. Gabe was just fucking around. Mikey was smarter than that, he’d go along with Gabe’s fuckery. Frank knew too and would fuck around right back. Pete was a bit oblivious at times, the most likely to fall for the fuckery.

“Get out my car, dumbass. We’re parked”, Gabe repeated smiling. 

Pete had been so caught up in his story and then the pizza, he didn’t realise that Gabe had pulled up to the local gas station. Pete looked out his window and smiled.

“You dick!”, he laughed as he opened the car door. 

Mikey knew Ray since they were little. He was Gerard’s best friend and a good friend of Mikey’s. He even felt like an older brother at times. Ray was twenty and he attended the local community college after taking a gap year and worked at the gas station part time. When he wasn’t working or going to school, he was usually at gigs or entertaining highschoolers who had nothing better to do but bother college students. 

“Hey Ray!”, Mike greeted as he entered the gas station. Ray looked up from the magazine he was reading, his head of curls bounced as he looked up. He smiled his toothy grin and waved.

“Hey boys, don’t you all got school?”, he asked.

“Yep”, Frank said.

Gabe entered the station, a little late from putting his smoke out. “ _ Raymond Manuel Toro-Ortiz _ !”, Gabe yelled as he entered. Gabe was loud and extra wherever he went, much like Pete but Gabe didn’t come off as obnoxious.

“ _ Gabriel Eduardo Saporta _ !”, Ray yelled back. The two were weird, they called each other by their full names and sometimes only spoke Spanish to each other. Mikey thinks it’s because they are the very few Hispanics around here. Even though they hailed from opposite sides of the Atlantic, they were still bonded by the language and whatever similarities there were in culture. They sometimes argue over dialects, it was quite funny at times even though Mikey couldn’t understand. Mikey never had to know what it was like to be a minority. Everyone around him was White, Italian to be specific. He’s glad Ray and Gabe can have that bond.

“Oh I like this song”, Gabe exclaimed. Gabe twirled his way into the ale way, knocking over a bag of chips which Mike picked up. It was some Tupac song, and Gabe started rapping the lyrics to it. Back in sophmore year, Gabe had a big hip-hop phase. Mikey internally laughed remembering how he used to wear thin fake gold chains and really baggy shorts. Holy shit, he still kind of dressed like that, just a little more punky. The shorts were replaced with jeans and the gold chains with silver, making Gabe look like he walked out of Grease. 

“Hey Gabe, I thought you stopped wearing  _ Phat Farm _ ”, Frank teased while looking at a tabloid. 

“Fuck you Frank, you’re just jelous that I can enjoy many diffrent genres of music. You act like you’re having a seizure every time you have to listen to anything but the Misfits. Like God Damn! There ain’t nothing wrong with a little beat!”, Gabe proclaimed all dramatically. He then proceeded to rap the words even louder.

Frank rolled his eyes and hid behind the magazines while Pete joined in, nodding along to the beat. Mikey leaned against the wall and laughed at them. His friends were dumbasses. Ray threw his magazine at Gabe who jumped.

“Oww, what was that for?” Gabe asked, picking the magazine up.

“For hurting my ears!”. Ray crossed his arms. “By something or go to school, you truant children”.

“Shut up, mom. I’m gonna buy something.” Gabe walked up to the counter. He grabbed a pack of Lucky’s and put it to the register.

Ray rolled his eyes. “ID? You’re seventeen till October.”

Gabe gave Ray and ‘are you serious look’. “PETE, come buy me smokes, you’re 18 right?”.

Ray laughed and rang up the smokes and took the two dollars from Gabe. “Now get out before I turn on the Latin station.”

Gabe smiled. He grabbed onto Mikey’s arm and tugged. “Mikey we are leaving right now. I’ll be damned if I have to listen to _ Como La Flor  _ ever again in my life.”

“My mom still cries sometimes”... Ray drifted off.

“Ray, you guys are not even Mexican! Why is she so bent up on Selena?”.

Ray shrugged. “Hey, Spanish is Spanish. I honestly don't know why she's into Selena Quintanilla \- oh, sorry. For  _ you _ it’s Quintanisha-”

“Fuck you, Toro”.

“Go to school, Gabe!”, Ray laughed, exposing his toothy smile. It was a nice smile. Ray was the nicest and genuine guy that Mikey knew that was still hilarious and fun to hang with. He was down with it. 

“All of you”, Ray added. He pointed at Frank who emerged from the Magazine sections before looking at Pete. “Go to fucking school!”, he yelled while shooing them out. “Fucking truant little shits…”


	3. School Days, School Days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just first days ya know?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter kind of sucks but I promise the next one will be better. The next chapter has the heat, iss real exciting. I hope yall are staying safe and are washing your hands and shit. If ya feel a little extra, lemme know if you like this work or not and if there is anything I can do to improve it.

They had all convened in the auditorium, taking seats and listening to the anual ‘You better be behaved and welcome freshmen’ speech before being handed their locker and schedule information. The boys had taken seats behind some of Pete's friends Joe and Andy. Pete made friends with them mainly because they were also from Chicago suburbs and moved in their early teens. They were like a mini Cubs fan club. Joe was a sophomore while Andy was a senior as well. 

They had all taken turns trying to get paper balls stuck in Joe’s hair that probably never saw water in it’s life. After getting forty eight paper spitballs in his hair (Mikey scored eight), Joe finally noticed and turned around, giving them the finger. He shook his hair out, getting the paper balls on everyone around them. Mikey cringed as he felt the wet paper and peeled them off carefully. They got their schedules and ran out of the auditorium to their new lockers.

“Aah, we’re locker neighbors”. Pete grinned as he leaned against Mikey’s locker. He had his and on his head posingly like a jock on a cheerleader’s locker. Mikey fished around his locker, putting his book bag in and checking the schedule he just got. English first period.

“And here I thought I could get away from you. Well fuck me then”, Mikey grumbled. He was joking, of course. Pete smiled.

“Sure, anyday Mikeyway. Imagine how cool it would be to have a body count of 11”, Pete responded thoughtfully. He leaned against his locker like he was actually thinking about it. “I should go find Patrick, I can’t wait for you to meet him”, Pete said, interrupting his own thoughts. 

Mikey nodded. He was interested in the infamous Patrick kid. “Can’t wait. Hey, you wanna go to the bridge after school?”, Mikey asked. There was a bridge that overlooked a small stream. Kids went there to smoke pot and screw around, there was always something interesting going on. Plus, Mikey really missed Pete over the summer. Pete was the only nice one. Gabe and Frank were jerks. Pete was also a sweetheart. If you could have a friend soulmate, Pete would definitely be Mikey’s friend soulmate. 

Pete clenched. “Sorry, I can’t. I promised to show Patrick around town”. Pete genuinely looked sorry. 

“How about I drive you all around?”, Mikey suggested. He tried to hide the way his face fell.

Pete leaned back onto the locker. “You have a car?”

“No but Gerard doesn’t start classes until next week.That means I have access to the Subaru. Gerard isn’t going anywhere”. It was true, Gerard didn’t go anywhere really. He just took the train to New York occasionally to hangout with art kids and sometimes visited Ray along with other kids from Bellview 95’. 

“Alright”, Pete smiled. “And how about we go to the bridge tomorrow, just you and me”.

Mikey smiled. “That’s cool”. He put his schedule in his pocket and closed his locker.“I’m gonna go now, gotta go find Alicia”. Alicia Simmons was the girl Mikey was chatting up. She had a reputation for being a ‘bad-girl rebel’ or whatever kids were saying about her now. It changed every so often. Mikey just thought she was funny and a cool person who just happened to be cute. They also happened to have dated when they were freshmens and currently were on a very, 'on-again-off-again' type of relashionship, where they were either a thing or just friends. It was odd.

Pete nodded. “Catch you later”.  
____________

Mikey met Patrick at lunch. Patrick looked like your typical freshman. He had redish hair and was kind of short. He also had this demonor about him, Mikey couldn’t quite put a finger on it. Patrick was only fourteen, but he seemed ten times more responsible than Pete and five times more responsible than Mikey. It was weird. Patrick was just very sure of himself.

“Hi, I’m Patrick”, he had greeted, sticking his hand and everything.

“Mikey Way”. Mikey shook his hand awkwardly. Who shook hands?

Pete, being Pete, was all over Patrick. He sat real close next to him instead of sitting next to Mikey like he usually did. After Pete introduced Patrick, they started talking about obscure Chicago bands and geeked out about their hometowns. They acted like everything was one big inside joke, big smiles and all. Mikey wondered if that was how he seemed with Gerard. He mentally noted to be less annoying when around Gerard.

By the time Mikey came around Pete’s to pick him up, Mikey was kind of pissed off. The school day had flown by fast with dull syllabus and lectures. Mikey nodded his head whenever a teacher looked at him and politely said, “it’s Mikey”, when a teacher called out for a Micheal Way. He had one class with Gabe, which was nice and he had math with Frank since Frank was smart and in senior math classes. That wasn’t why he was pissed.

Pete, in all his Pete-ness glory, might have ‘accidentally’ invited Patrick to go to the bridge with them. Pete had told Mikey right before he got into Gerard’s car. Pete looked nervous, like Mikey might have bitten his head off. Mikey just shrugged and said “see you later’, before getting in the passenger's seat and sighing.

Gerard took one look at Mikey and sighed. “I’d ask how your day was but…”

“My day was good, actually. Pete’s just being annoying”. Mikey slumped into the seat and sighed. He dug in the side compartment of the car knowing that’s where Gerard kept his cigarettes. He was trying to cut back, but right now was a special occasion. “He kind of just… blowing off plans to hangout with this Patrick kid. I don’t know why I’m pissed about it, he’s just being annoying”, Mikey said as he lit two cigarettes. He handed one to Gerard, who took it graciously.

“It’ll probably blow over soon”, Gerard reassured. Mikey just nodded.  
“Wanna go get coffee or ice cream or some shit?”, Gerard asked. It was his attempt to cheer Mikey up. “Oh, we can like get coffee ice cream and watch Pulp Fiction. I just borrowed the VHS from Ray when I saw him today”. Gerard smiled thinking about the plans being made, which caused Mikey to smile.

“That would be awesome”.


	4. Call me, Call me Anytime

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't do drugs kids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Mentions of drug use. (Also the fic from now on has a lot of drug mentions, even if the main characters aren't drug addicts there's gonna be some refrences.) Just letting it out there in case you are touch about that kind of stuff. :)
> 
> Warning: Mild Patrick hate in this chapter, don't worry, it will not remain this way!

Mikey decided he didn’t quite like the Patrick kid. It was October and he still hadn’t grown on Mikey like Pete said he would. Mikey thinks it’s because the way he knows everything about Pete and isn’t afraid to show it. He knows all the stories Pete tells from his childhood and all the Illinois references. He knows how to help Pete when Pete feels sad (which is a lot) and he knows how to make Pete calm down when he is too high up. Mikey used to think Pete and him were platonic soul mates, but he knows now that it’s actually Pete and Patrick. They should just marry each other. Their initials were even “PP”, Pete would get a kick out of that.

The thing was, Mikey also didn’t quite dislike Patrick. He was nice to talk about music with and he could be funny when he wanted to be. On his own, Patrick was actually nice company. It was just when he was with Pete that it bothered Mikey. Patrick was like Pete’s keeper in an odd way and Pete was the catalyst for Patrick’s confidence. He’d always cheer Patrick on and hype him up. It’s like they were meant for eachother. And that’s what bothered Mikey, only sometimes. Just sometimes. Mikey probably liked Patrick 70% of the time.

Mikey trudged his way through the empty school hallways. Class started fifteen minutes ago but Mikey couldn’t be bothered by it. He was too pissed off to go to class. Pete had blown off plans with Mikey to hangout with Patrick, again. Mikey wouldn’t be too pisssed of, if it wasn’t the third time in two weeks that Pete blew him off. Mikey didn’t know why he was so upset, everybody always blew him off. Hell, Mikey even blew people off. It shouldn’t be a big deal, except it was.

Whatever, screw Pete, Mikey would just go to the local park with Frank and smoke cigarettes on the playground roof while scaring away all the little kids and laughing at the dirty looks parents would give because they were just little shits like that. It was a favorite Friday night activity of Mikey and Frank. Gabe, being a whole eleven months older than Mikey, thought it was “juvenile”or whatever SAT word he decided to use to sit on a playground and scare children. “I’m a man, Mikeyway. Fuckin’ 18! I can’t be doing that shit no more”. Gabe and Pete loved to bring up the fact that they were eighteen, like Mikey or Frank actually gave a shit. Frank was turning sixteen and Mikey just turned seventeen. They liked to bask in their youth.

Mikey continues to roam the halls aimlessly. He made sure to drag his converse on the tiled floors. His shoes were beat up, he hadn’t bought a new pair in about three years. Everybody at school was going for the ‘beat up torn up’ look. Well, at least the kids who listened to good music. The highschool elites had taken to calling anyone who listened to grunge or metal ‘burnouts’. It might have been vaguely marijuana related. Mikey didn’t give a shit. 

Mikey turned as the hall ended and he walked right back down the hall. Maybe walking up and down the same hall wasn’t a good idea, because a teacher popped their head out of a classroom and yelled “Go to class!”, before returning to their room. Mikey rolled his eyes and decided to go outside instead. He opened the doors at the end of the hall and made his way to the dumpsters. Kids went to smoke there. Maybe he’d see somebody he knew.

It was quite sunny for October. Mikey squinted as he walked, his fingertips brushing up against the school walls. It was also cold. Mikey popped the collar of his blue jeans jacket and fished the front pocket for a cigarette. He found a cigarette, which surprised him since he hardly smoked any more (he only had an occasional smoke or chain smoked all night, no inbetween). He searched for a lighter, which he didn’t have. He saw the outline of two kids at the corner of the school wall and hurried up to them.

As he approached, he saw who the two kids were. It was Bert Mckrakken (commonly knick-named Bert McCrackhead) and Bob Bryar. Bert dropped out last year while Bob was a Senior. Rumors had spread that Bob was like twenty and failed a few grades. Mikey never asked, he never really cared for Bob. Mikey knew that Bert was a good friend of Gerard. He was the only underclassmen (well now ex-underclassmen) that Gerard still talked to. The two seemed to be arguing, but not at each other.

“I told you, he got expelled”, Bob said. He looked pissed.

“Yeah, I heard you the first time”, Bert countered. He looked even more pissed. “Look, I’ve got a fucking gun to my head and I did not need for Pleiser to get expelled. You don’t push, you refuse to for some reason. God damn, We’re screwed…”, Bert suddenly stopped talking. He turned to face Mikey and his whole demeanor dropped. He smiled and got out of Bob’s face.

“Hey, Mikey”, he smiled. Bert was a hard ass and he didn’t like very many people but he seemed to like Mikey okay. It was probably because Mikey was Gerard’s brother. Bert and Gee were strangely close, as close as a highschool dropout and a depressed art student could be.

Mikey decided he was gonna pretend that he hadn’t heard a thing. You make sure not to get into other people’s business if you don’t want a gun to your head. Mikey knew that Bert was into some shady things. Bert visited Gerard occasionally over the summer. They’d go down to Gerard’s basement room and come back up all giddy and happy go lucky. Mikey knew that Gerard was never happy go lucky. He debated asking Gerard what the hell they were doing down there, but decided against it. Mikey wouldn’t ask about Gerard’s drinking binges and whatever else he was doing and in return Gerard wouldn’t ask about Mikey’s highschool shenanigans. 

“Hey Bert, hey Bob. Any of you got a light?”, Mikey asked, hopping that they had a light. He actually really wanted a smoke.

“Yeah”, Bert said as he dug one out his back pocket. He put it up to Mikey’s cigarette that was dangling out of his lips. 

“Thanks”, Mikey said through smoke. He turned to walk away thinking he’d rather leave the two to their business, but Bert grabbed Mikey’s shoulder and pulled him back.

“Hey, why don’t you stay a minute?”, Bert asked. His long hair swayed in the wind and he was half-smile, showing his hyena-like teeth.

Bob just stood there and rolled his eyes like this was the last place on earth he wanted to be. Mikey thought he actually saw Bob muble a prayer. Maybe Bob was just cursing the universe out. Or maybe he was cursing Bert out.

Mikey stood there. He didn’t say anything, he knew Bert would talk. You just don’t hangout with Bert if you’re not in his circle, he usually wants something. Or he just wants to hang, you never know.

Bert shuffled around a bit. He narrowed his eyes threateningly at Bob before swaying his arms around. He finally looked up and towards Mikey.

“So, I was wondering if you could do me a favor”, Bert started. Bob rolled his eyes again, earning him a kick in the shin from Bert. “You wouldn’t like mind giving somebody something from me?”

Mikey shrugged. He really didn’t mind. He wasn’t exactly planning on going to class thirty minutes late as the class would be over soon. He might even skip next period if he still felt like it. Might as well help ol’ Bert out in the process. “Sure”.

Bert smiled. “Okay, Okay, okay good. Fuck you Bob, don’t look at me like that. Okay, so before I like to say anything else, you’re not like straight edge or anything? Like that Andy kid?”. Bert’s eyebrows were raised and he seemed genuinely curious.

“No. I’m not… I’m not straight edge. Bert, I’m smoking right now, of course I’m not straight edge”.

Bert shook his head. “No I mean like, it’s one thing to smoke but it’s another thing to like…”

“He is asking if you do drugs”, Bob interrupted annoyed. 

“Or if you have an issue with drugs”, Bert added.

Mikey laughed. He had little issues with drugs, especially of the green kind (he was an occasional pot smoker.) Or the pill kinds/ tablet kinds, although those were for special occasions, like when Gabe turnt sixteen and bought fucking ectasy because he thought he was the shit. 

“I don’t have any issues”, Mikey responded with quirked eyebrows. He was curious what the hell Bert wanted him to do.

“Alright, Alright”, Bert grinned while digging in his pockets. His eyes lit up as he found what he was looking for. “I always knew you were an okay kid. You have to be, I mean you’re Gerard’s younger brother. Of course you’re okay! You always seemed a little more rough around the edges than Gerard, but that is just Gerard. He’s a little soft, just a little”. He swayed his arms around like a maniac.

“Bert shut the fuck up”, Bob gruffed.

Bert was smiling like a madman, perhaps he was remembering something Gerard did. Bert handed Mikey a brown bag. He held his hand down on Mikey’s a little longer than typical. Mikey started wondering if Bert was a madman, crazy or whatever. Then he realized that everyone around him was crazy, Bert was just the norm.

Mikey looked down at the bag and understood what Bert had been blabbering about. It was a bag of pot. Mikey shoved it in his pocket. “Who is this for?”, Mikey asked.

“It’s for this kid… Brendon Urie? You know who he is”, Bert said with a wave of his hand. “Ya know, if you need a few bucks… would you mind making some… deliveries for me?”

Mikey raised his eyes. Bert literally just asked him if he wanted to sell drugs. Be a fucking drug dealer. Mikey almost laughed. Back in eight grade and when Frank was in seventh grade, they all decided that Pete was the most likely to become a drug dealer and Frank was the most likely to be the one buying drugs. Well, it looks like Mikey just might beat Pete to it. 

At the same time, Mikey knew he shouldn’t get caught up in that. He knew that if you got caught with that, you could get suspended or worse, expelled. He also didn’t think that getting involved with whatever Bert Mckraken was doing was a good idea. Bert was weird. But, Mikey did need money. It would be easy money Plus, Mikey wouldn’t be the one selling them, he was just a middle man. That’s all. He wouldn’t be like, a real drug dealer.

“Sure”. Mikey took a drag from his forgotten cigarette. “You know where to find me”. 

Bert chuckled. “Also, if you ever need something, I’m your guy okay?”.

“Yeah, sure. Hey, you got any weed on you right now? I gotta twenty”, Mikey asked. It had been over a month since he smoked weed. He kind of wanted to after all the talk of drugs. Bert nodded and dug in one of his pockets. He pulled out a back and looked in it, probably examining if it was twenty dollars worth. He handed him the bag and took the twenty.

“Nice doing business”, Bert said. Mikey nodded and walked off.

“Tell your brother to call me”, Bert called after as Mikey walked in the building, hoping to catch Brendon Urie in the halls.


	5. This Season's Losers of the Year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> High key filler but important filler

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ay so this chapter has a Brendon and Ryan cameo! Also I just wanted to say that Alicia will be frequenting the next few chapters but don't worry, this is defenitly a Petekey fic. Also wanted to say I have at least 20K words prewritten for this and am being greedy by holding them heheheh

Mikey caught Brendon on his way to English. Brendon was out in the hallway laughing his head off at what another kid with fringed hair was saying. Class was starting soon and Mikey quickly approached them and tapped Brendon on his shoulder. He jumped and turned around.

“Hey, I know you”, he immediately said, a little confused, like he knew he knew Mikey but didn’t quite know who Mikey was. The kid next to him shut up quickly.“I think I’ve seen you around at some of Gabe Sapota’s parties”, he concluded. “

Mikey nooded. “Uh yeah, I’ve seen you around there”. Last year, Brendon Urie had a reputation of being the freshmen that was able to do seven shots of Tito’s Vodka and smoke a bowl without passing out or puking. It was truly an impressive feat and landed him in Gabe’s good books. Pete too, Pete really liked the kid for some reason. Mikey assumed that Bendon probably doesn’t remember ever talking to Mikey. Mikey had never really talked to Brendon outside a party even though he was well acquainted with Gabe and Pete. 

“Uh, Bert asked me to give you this”, Mikey said. He looked around to see if there were any hall guards or police officers around before handing him the bag. There were occasionally cops walking around the school since it was in a tougher neighborhood.

Brendon smiled. “Oh,” he said, suddenly understanding why Mikey Way randomly approached him out of nowhere. “I wonder what happened to Pelissier”, Brendon murmured while grabbing the bag.

Mikey froze up for a little. He knew a Pelssier, a Matt Pelssier, but everyone called him Otter. Mikey and Matt used to hangout in middle school, even freshman year. He was good friends with Gerad and Ray. Mikey used to tag along with the older boys back when they were in highschool together and he’d watch them smoke and play dungeons and dragons all day when they were in highschool and Mikey was still in middle school. Mikey laughed to himself, Gerad was such a loser. Everyone (as in all the punk kids Mikey hung around) got on Mikey for being geeky and kind of a nerd, but Gerard was the ultimate geek. Which was why, of course, Mikey loved him so much. Mikey smiled at the memories, he really wondered what happened to Otter. He was a grade younger than Ray and Geard, and he kind of dropped off the face of the earth.

“Matt?”, the other kid asked. Mikey peaked up again, it was Matt.

“Yeah, Matt Pelssier, he used to… you know what I’m talking about, Ryan, you know, whatever'', Brendon laughed while waving his arm in the air. His eyes were red and puffy, he was probably currently high. “Hey, You’re friends with Pete, right?”, Brendon asked. Mikey nodded. “Well, can you tell him that I’m totally gonna kick his ass the next time I see him”, Brendon laughed. “He’s been bothering the shit out of me”.

“Sure”, Mikey said. 

He began to walk away when Brendon asked, “Hey, wait, what’s your name again?”.

“Mikey Way”.

Brendon’s face stiffened. He looked shocked and fazed. It only lasted for a minute, though. “Oh, that’s Mikey Way”, he said to the other kid and they left laughing before Mikey could ask anything else. Mikey just shook it off and headed to English.

When he opened the door to his English class, he was met with a full classroom. He checked the clock, great, he was five minutes late to class. He could have sworn he was making good time. The teacher turnt from the blackboard, her large black curls bounced with her. God, even the teachers down here were Italian. She gave him a stern look and shook her head before turning back to the blackboard, scribbling away with the chalk. Mikey hurried to his desk in the back next to Alicia.

Alicia smiled at him. She looked amused. “Ms. Rossi has it out for you”, she teased. Mikey rolled his eyes and gave Alicia the finger. 

“We have to work on group projects, since you were late, I decided to do the honors of volunteering to be your partner. Now you’re stuck with me”, she grinned. 

“I’m cool with that. I mean, I’m shit at English, you’re shit at English, and two negatives make a positive”.

“That’s the attitude!”. Alicia scooted her desk closer to Mikey’s. “So we have to like… write a narrative. But first we have to write the rough draft and brainstorm and what not”. Alicia got a paper and pencil out. “So…. who’s gonna write?”.

Nobody wanted to be the scribe in a group project. It was one thing to write down your own thoughts, but to write down other people's thoughts too? That was too much. Nobody wanted to write in a group project.

“If you write, I’ll share a joint with you after lunch”, Mikey offered quietly, making sure Ms.Rossi wouldn’t hear. He was planning on smoking under the bleachers and Alicia was just going to leech off of him anyways. He might as well get something out of it. He could share a joint with Alicia and maybe share some with Frank later on when they went to the park.

“That’s fine with me”, Alicia grinned. She grabbed the pencil and paper and proceeded to scribble furiously.


	6. Hangin' Out Down The Street

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Boys being dumb asses

The night air was crisp like a cold glass of water and the sky was fading into purple. The playground equipment was still nasty as ever and smelt like an elementary school bathroom, but it was still nice in a weird twisted way. It was strangely nostalgic. It was going to always be like this. Mikey would always just be hanging out with somebody on the playground.

Frank swung on the swings idily. He was trying to act all deep, smoking a cigarette and pondering life while staring in the distance. Mikey kind of laughed at Frank. Franking trying to act mature was just bullshit. Mikey knew that he and Frank would always be the babies of the group, the younger brothers. Shoot, Frank was only fifteen. The boys had probably corrupted poor Frank when Frank transferred in at seventh grade. Then again, Frank became a little stoner wanna be tough guy in his Freshman year when he started hanging around the skate park and hanging around the skate folks. That part was entirely on Frank.

“Drop your tough guy act, Frank. You look stupid”, Mikey commented as he took the swing next to Frank.

Frank giggled a little while taking a drag from his smoke. “I’m not the one with the tough guy act, my act is all natural”.

“So that’s why you get shoved in so many lockers, huh?”.

Frank went red. He looked down and stubbed out his smoke. “Shut up. God, that was only like… one or two or like-”

“Seven times?”

“Shut up!”. Frank lit another cigaratte. “You can be a big fucking dick some times”, Frank noted. Mikey just shrugged. “Any ways, I heard from the loop that you were hanging out with Bert earlier”, Frank said.

Mikey furrowed his eyebrows. It wasn’t exactly hanging out per say, more like talking. “We were just talking, Bob Bryar was there too.”

“I know, Bob was the one who told me. I have him in gym. He said, ‘your friend Mikey Way is one weird kid’ and then told me that Bert was talking to you and you didn’t punch him in the face. Which is apparently what most people do when Bert Mckraken talks to you”. Frank did a mock punch and giggled. “What was he even talking to you about?”.

“He was like, asking me to do a favor for him. I think he’s a drug dealer…”, Mikey thought about it for a second. “Nah, he’s definitely a drug dealer. He basically asked me to give Brendon Urie a bag of weed ‘cause he dropped out and can’t go inside the school building no more.”

Frank nodded. “You know, that kind of makes sense, since I heard that Bert was like a meth addict or something. He dropped out to go to rehab and then his parents kicked him out and he caught a bus, fell asleep, and woke up in New Jersey. Or at least that’s what I’ve heard”.

Mikey’s eyes widened. He didn’t know that about Bert. All he knew was that one day Bert wasn’t here and then he was. “No shit?”, he asked.

“No shit”, Frank responded, flaking his ash. “He tried to register for the school here, but I think he dropped out of this one too”, Frank said, frowning. “I haven’t seen him around here, that’s why I’m saying that”.

Mikey nooded. It would Make sense, Bert didn’t speak like a northerner. He also bitched about Mormons a lot and there weren’t any Mormons up here. 

“He also said if I ever need extra money, I could help him out with that sorts of stuff”, Mikey added. He fumbled his back pocket for a cigarette. A trip to the playground wouldn’t be whole without chain smoking of some sorts. He lit it up as he said, “I might just take up his offer since I wanna get the hell outta here after this year”.

Frank understandingly nodded, although he seemed a bit down. “You all are gonna leave me alone next year”, he huffed. He looked real sad pouting on the swing, swinging back and forth. 

“Stop, your pouting. You should like, make friends with other people, stop being a dick to everybody”, Mikey countered, even though he really was sad to leave Frank behind. Frank and Mikey were thick as thieves and it just wouldn’t be the same without Frank. While Gabe was the one Mikey went to parties with and Pete was the one Mikey would talk deep feelings with, Frank could do both. Whenever Gabe and Pete decided to screw around and do “older kid stuff”, Mikey and Frank would go watch movie marathons, talk about girls, and play Galaga all night. If they stayed at Frank’s then they’d smoke weed at nine am before Ms. Iero forced them to go to Church and Mikey would go even though he could just walk home because it was kind of funny watching old white men excitedly preach when you are extremely stoned. Mikey and Frank would always be the babies of the group and quite frankly, they were okay with it. Shit, Mikey would really miss the kid.

“I got lots of friends”, Frank said, pouting more. Mikey thought about it for a while. Frank did know a lot of people, he just never hung out with other people outside of parties. Well, he did go skating sometimes with his skating friends, but other than that he just hung around Mikey and Mikey hung around Pete and Gabe so Frank hung around them too.

“Okay, how about you get a girlfriend, then?”, Mikey offered.

“Shut up, Mikey. I’ll get there when I get there”, Frank blushed. Frank had never had a girlfriend and it sometimes bothered him.

Mikey had only had one real girlfriend, Alicia. They knew each other since they were in middle school. They’d hang out at the Way’s porch and listen to Gerard’s CDs and cassettes when Gerard had forgotten to put them away and laugh at stupid jokes that only they’d understand. In freshman year they decided to ‘date’ or whatever freshmans did in relationships. Like most freshmen relationships, they broke up by the spring because Alicia developed a crush on some senior jock type, dated him for a few months before he left in the summer. Mikey and Alicia had still remained close friends because there were no hard feelings and you just can’t lose somebody like that. A lot of people thought it was weird that they still went to the bleachers together to smoke every day during lunch and that they still laughed like they did when they were together. They also thought it was weird that Alicia in all her bad girl glory hung out with Mikey Way, this scrawny punky-geeky-grunge kid. Eventually, the duo got back together sometime in early sophomore year and actually stayed together through the whole year. In the summer before junior year, Alicia went to spend the summer with her father in North Carolina and they decided to ‘take a break’, meaning Alicia wanted to sleep with some Southern boys and Mikey wanted to chat up different Jersey girls. It was a mutual break up.

Junior year was filled with a bunch of random hookups with each other, although they weren’t technically together, but they weren’t technically not together. They were more than friends with benefits and less than dating. They weren’t exclusive but they were only messing around with each other. Gabe had given up entirely on trying to describe their relationship. “You and Alicia make fucking Pre-Calculus look easy, Mikeyway”. Pete had tried playing relationship counselor, “You’re issue is that you two get bored of each other too easily, break up, and then go back. It’s like when you listen to the same album over and over again and can’t stand it no more. Then you wait three months before listing to it again and it’s like heaven. I bet you all get board so easily because your sex life is boring as fuck. You should invest in some handcuffs or something".

They still remained in the weird grey area, although Mikey was working on changing that. Still, Mikey figures that he probably wasn’t one to be giving out relationship advice considering him and Alicia’s past, but it was still worth a shot.

“I think Gabe was right, though. Jamia totally likes you. You should ask her out”. Frank blushed and Mikey smiled. Even if they were both the babies, Mikey was still a year older. “You should totally ask her out. I can even be your wingman. Maybe I’ll make progress with Alicia and then we can like a double date”. Mikey wrinkled his nose. “God, forget I said that, I sound like a chick. But you should ask her out”.

Frank rolled his eyes. “I doubt you’ll get anywhere with Alicia. She’s out of your league now. She might give you pity hook ups, but I think that’s as far as she’ll get”. 

Mikey snorted. Frank was obviously trying to change the subject. Frank’s favorite way of changing the subject was being a dick. Mikey swung a little slower and leaned his swing closer to Frank.

“Ask Jamia out”, he almost whispered.

Frank flushed. “Fuck off, Mikey Way”.


	7. Things So Complicated

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yeah

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear better chapters are coming up

The next day, Mikey entered his first period trigonometry class quietly and prepared to actually get work done. He sat down at his normal seat and sighed, looking at the chalkboard. An array of ‘Warm Up’ problems were scribbled on the chalkboard that were foriegn to Mikey. Mikey must have missed a lot yesterday, because he didn’t quite understand the problems. Still, he buckled down and opened up his notebook, preparing to give it his all. 

As he was working on his math work, the teacher strode up by his desk and placed a paper on his desk. Mikey grabbed the papers and examined the yellow slip. It was a detention slip. For the reason why, it listed “truancy”. Mikey mentally kicked himself. He had forgotten yesterday that he had already missed this class three times in a month. It was the school’s rule that after the third time, you got a detention. Fuck. Mikey hoped the rest of the day would be better.

_______

“I swear to god, I am going to kill Pete”, Mikey yelled. He was pacing up and down Frank’s bedroom, like a madman. Mikey should have known that the detention was going to be the start of a bad day. It just kept on getting worse and worse.

They had been out with Gabe, just driving around and listening to the radio in Gabe’s nasty truck after school and before Gabe went to work. They were cruising by the town center when they spotted Pete and his Chicago friends playing some sort of game involving a ball by the fields. Pete had said his mom grounded him again and yet here he was, playing a weird soccer kickball fusion with the Chicago kids. Gabe had ruefully smiled and shook his head. “That fucker”, he mumbled. It was the first time Mikey saw Gabe serious about anything. Gabe never gave a shit about anything it seemed and here he was, upset that Pete had blown them off. Frank rolled his eyes. Mikey just felt a twinge in his stomach. A sickening twinge.

Shortly after, Gabe dropped the boys off at Frank’s. Frank asked if Gabe wanted to stay but Gabe had shaken his head and went back to his truck. “I gotta go work a shift, I can’t ask Beckette to cover for me, even though he owes but whatever”, Gabe snarked, although Mikey could see that Gabe was a little hurt underneath all his asshole-ness. 

“I’ll help you. To be quite honest, I thought this whole ‘I’m only hanging out with Patrick’ thing would blow over by now”, Frank sighed from his bed. He was laying down and sulking.

“God damn, you think he’s home by now? Would you wanna call him?”, Mikey asked. Even if he was really mad at Pete, he still really wanted to talk to him.

Frank hoped of his bed. “Let’s do it”. They hurried to the living room, where the phone was. Ms.Iero must have been in her room, because the living room was perfectly empty. Mikey punched in the numbers, and Frank huddled his head in as the ringer rang. Pete answered on the fifth beep.

“Hello?”, he said.

“Pete, what the fuck”, Frank started.

“Huh?”, Pete asked.

“You know what you did”, Mikey started. “Look, we don’t give a shit if you don’t wanna hang anymore. We’re not little kids. We do give a shit that you lied to us”.

“Also, you’ve been a dick lately”, Frank continued. “We just wanted to let you know that you’re being a jerk. That’s all”. Frank grabbed the phone from Mikey’s hands and hung up. 

“Let’s go play some atari”.


	8. I Said Hey, What's Goin' On?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pete being wack as crack

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to apoligize because I reread the chapters and reliezed I made the characters talk weird, not very Northern. I guess I'm from the Mid-Alantic too, but just not that North up like Jeresy or New York(ie were the characters suposed to be from). It's weird how different vocabulary and dialects changes from the Mason Dixon line (I'm south of the Dixie). We talk very differently here an' Ah did'int evan nowtice mah own Washin'tin accent was slipping through the characters. I'm trying to write them diffrently from her out, please bear with me. Thank you- Dangsu

The next day at school, Mikey saw Pete in between classes as they both were fiddling through their lockers. Mikey had gotten there first and then Pete decided to sneak up very quietly (well quite to Mikey, who was very oblivious). Mikey had just put away his trigonometry book when Pete slammed into him.

“Got you! Mikeyway”, Pete screamed. His smile was infectious, even as Mikey was on the disgusting school floor with a now throbbing ankle. Even after Mikey and Frank yelled at Pete on the phone. Pete was just to… Pete. Mikey grinned. He couldn’t help it.

“Screw you, Wentz”, he laughed while getting up. 

Pete helped pull Mikey up. Once Mikey was up and looked at Pete, Pete’s grin immediately faltered and he shyed away a few steps. He smiled sheepishly and got to his locker, twisting his code in and focusing real hard on the dull blue paint job of it.

“Look man, I’m really sorry about being a dick lately. I didn’t even really notice I was being on until Frank brough it up. I just… I just”, he trailed off. Mikey hunched over his locker, studying Pete. He looked like a deer caught in headlights. Mikey had known Pete long enough to know when Pete was about to go off into the deep end and Pete acted just like this. He’d get jumbled up, become frantic, then have a meltdown.

“I’m sorry. I really am. Look, I just- I'll talk to you at lunch, I gotta go”, Pete stuttered before running off, leaving his locker wide open. 

Mikey sighed. He knew Pete probably needed space right now. He needed to go calm down so he wouldn’t break down. Even if he really wanted to go run after Pete and comfort him, he knew he couldn’t. It was best to let Pete cool before approaching him and Mikey also couldn’t miss anymore class. 

Mikey closed Pete’s locker and leaned against it. He laid his head in his hands. Why was Pete acting so weird? Mikey just thought Pete was getting caught up with Patrick, but it seemed like something a little more was going on. Mikey would definitely be sure to check up on Pete. He felt a tinge in his stomach and realized that he was really worried about Pete. 

Pete could do really stupid things when he got himself worked up. Back in Sophmore year, about a week after Mikey and Alicia got back together, Pete had a huge break down. He froze up during a soccer match, causing the team to lose. He then had a total freak out afterwards. He disappeared for three days. Apparently he had taken the bus to a friend's apartment in New York, where he did acid and tripped for two days before returning to worried family and friends.He seemed really shaken up when he returned. He wouldn’t tell anyone why he did it and didn’t tell anybody what happened while he was there, said he didn’t remember. 

Mikey worried about Pete alot. Pete was special to Mikey. He couldn’t quite describe it. They were just special. He was still a little pissed off, a half assed apology wouldn’t cut all the bullshit. He needed a full alibi. Mikey shook his head, he’d find Pete later. Right now he had to go to class. He’d see Pete at lunch.


	9. Our Lips Are Sealed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bob being a big phat dick

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like everyone to know that this Alicia thing is temparary, do not worry. :)

Mikey didn’t see Pete at lunch. He even asked Patrick if he knew where Pete was. Patrick just shrugged and Mikey rolled his eyes ruefully. Even Pete’s conjoined twin didn’t know where Pete was. Mikey figured he didn’t have any reason to stick around the cafeteria any more and Alicia tugged at his sleeve.

The two walked out to the bleachers, as they did everyday, and Mikey wrapped his arm around her shoulder. Alicia didn’t even bother to shove his arm off. She just smiled. Mikey felt a little victorious, if Pete wouldn’t be around him, at least he had Alicia. The two joked and laughed all the way down to the bleachers. They walked under them and entered the world of High School Losers. All the smokers, burnouts, punks, metalheads and wanna be metalheads all in one place intermingling. Mikey smiled, he felt like he belonged here. There wasn’t a single ounce of preps of jocks (Pete Wentz was the only jock who was allowed down here), no team spirit, just teen spirit. 

Mikey and Alicia found their usual spot in the corner and sat down. They even cuddled a little closer and Mikey felt very victorious. He was getting step and step closer to stepping out of the odd grey area they were in. He smiled to himself. He’d love to kiss Alicia in public, in front of Pete. Wait… in front of Pete?, He asked himself, Why infront of Pete? That’s so random… You know what, I’m not thinking of Pete right now. 

Alicia drew a cigarette out. Lately she was the only one smoking under the bleachers as Mikey was trying to cut back. She lit up and took a drag before offering it to Mikey. Mikey laughed and took it quickly before giving it back. “Thanks”, he said. Alicia smiled. It was her turn to throw her arm around Mikey. 

“No problem”, she purred. She pushed her head into his neck and smiled. “You know, I’ve been thinking about stuff lately. Us, I mean. I kind of miss the old days. Back in Freshman and Sophomore year.”

Mikey should be excited. This was totally his chance to get back together with Alicia, which is what he wanted. He wanted to be a thing with Alicia again, a real thing. But for some reason, some ungodly reason, he could only think about Pete right now. He thought how Pete would look at Mikey with Alicia around his waist, as a couple. Would Pete care? Would he be jealous? God, but it’s not like Mikey wanted to date Pete. He didn’t know why he was thinking about Pete. He wasn’t gay and he didn’t like Pete. I like Alicia, he told himself.

“Those were some good days”, he forced himself to say. He wasn’t lying, those were good days. He just didn’t know if he wanted to replay those days. Sure, maybe in September he wanted to get back with Alicia. But now, maybe not so much. At the same time, he did really like Alicia. He thinks he loves her, he just doesn’t know if it’s platonically or romantically. Shoot, it seemed like he had this all figured out in September.

Alicia smiled as she took another drag from her cigarette. “You know, it’s a friday... “, she trailed, a dopey smile plastered on her face. She was cute… she really was. “My mom works late today… like so late, you know she doesn’t leave until like elleven and then she always always always stops at Denny’s for dinner. So like… did you wanna recreate some of the old days?”, she asked.

Mikey turned to look at her. Her eyes were surrounded by eyeliner and glowing with sparks. She was biting her lip ever so slightly and was sporting a small goofy half smile. For a second there, Mikey wasn’t even thinking about Pete, just for a second.

“I’d love to”, he smiled back. Alicia laughed. She grabbed Mikey’s glasses and put them on her face. 

“Do I look good with your glasses on?”, she asked before planting a sloppy kiss on Mikey. Mikey kissed back and Alicia giggled, kissing some more. Mikey didn’t even think about Pete.   
After a few moments, Alicia pulled back. 

“Alight, I’m gonna go back to the cafeteria, I have to talk to Lindsey about a project we’re doing in Biology”. She stood up and patted some dirt off her jeans. “See you later”, she waved a strood of back to the school building. 

Mikey smiled to himself. At least he had Alicia. Pete could go and blow Mikey off and hang out with who ever he fucking wanted to, but at least Mikey had Alicia. But there was still a voice in the back of Mikey’s head telling him not to go to Alicia’s. It was also thinking about Pete. Mikey shook his head as if it would stop it from spinning.

Before Mikey could do anymore pondering on his odd twisted emotions, he was interrupted by Bob Bryar of all people. “Hey, Mikey!”, he shouted from across the bleachers. Mikey perked up and turnt his head to face him. He was standing around with some of his friends, smoking and laughing. Bob smiled and waved to him, beckoning him over. Mikey stood up from the dusty ground and slowly walked over. He was really confused. Why was Bob Bryar wanting to talk to him? The last time he saw Bob, Bob was acting like he wanted to kick Mikey’s ass. He also told Frank that Mikey was weird. Mikey really hoped this wasn’t a practical joke.

When Mikey finally got there, he made sure to slouch and hook his fingers through his jeans pockets. He plastered his infamous bored face and tried to hide in his oversized jeans jacket. Bob just kind of rolled his eyes.

“Stop acting like I killed your dog in your face. God damn, you look like a poor man’s grease, minus the hair grease”, Bob said thoughtfully. 

Mikey had to stop his eyebrows from furrowing because what the hell was Bob even going on about? Bob seemed to sense Mikey’s confusion and laughed. 

“Look, I’m not here to kick your ass if that’s what you’re worried about”, Bob said. Some of his friends laughed. Mikey just shrugged. “Look”, he continued, flicking some ash, “Bert says he’s gonna drop by later, that cool?”.

Bert neve ‘dropped by’ the Way’s unless Gerard was over. “Why?”, Mikey asked.  
Bob rolled his eyes again. “You know why”, he replied. 

Oh, that. Mikey understood. Maybe Bert needed some more help. Although it was weird, why if Bert couldn’t deliver the drugs himself, why didn’t Bob do it? Why did he just meet up with people outside of the school? Mikey decided he didn’t really care to know, it was Bert’s busnes.

“Alright”. Mikey turned away from Bob and his clique of assholes. Bob chuckled a little and his friends got back to talking obnoxiously and laughing. Mikey rolled his eyes and walked off. They were such jerks. 

“Oh, yeah, Mikey?”, Bob called after Mikey was a few yards away.

“What?”.

“That’s a cute girl you got”, Bob said, a grin growing on his face. What the fuck was that supose to mean? Was that a threat? Was Bob just messing with him? What the hell? His friends just laughed. They were all tall, which was a rarity for this town as everyone was 5’7 or 5’8 at the max. They could totally beat Mikey up.

“Whatever, Bryar”, Mikey sneered and continued to walk away. He decided right there and then that Bob was the biggest asshole he knew.


	10. When I See You Notice On Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bert gives the DL

Bert stopped by twenty minutes after Mikey had gotten home. He had just put down his school bag and gotten his English papers out when he heard a knock on the door. He slowly opened it to see Bert waving. Mikey opened the door and beckoned him in.

“Hey”, Bert started. He stood in the doorway, shifting uncomfortably. He seemed really shaky and jumpy. “So like, I was wondering if you wanted to help out?”, he fumbled a bit. “Like, I can’t go on school grounds without getting my ass arrested, the times you saw me with Bob, that was a one time thing.”

“Okay, but I’m just wondering, why can’t Bob do it?”, Mikey asked. He closed the door and leaned against the wall.

“Bob, he- he won’t do it. He just likes it, he doesn't like to, you know?”, Bert asked. “He’s weird. He’s kind of a pussy. Like he’s scared of getting caught”.

Mikey could of laughed. Bob Bryar, the toughest, strong, bulky Bob Bryar was scared of delivering drugs? He was a pussy. Any doubt Mikey had about helping Bert was shed, if Bob was to scared to do it, Mikey totally was going to do it, just to have something over Bob.

“Alright, that’s cool”, Mikey said, trying to hide his laughter. “Just tell me what you want me to do”.

Bert smiled. “You’re mom here?”. Mikey shook his head. Whatever Bert wanted to talk about was most likely not something Mikey would want his mom around for. Bert shifted his eyes like he was looking for Ms.Way. Satisfied that she wasn’t here, he said, “Alight, lemme tell you”.

Mikey led Bert to the living room. They sat down on the couch and Bert pulled out some bags from his jacket. He had labeled them by name and weight and price. He told Mikey who each baggie was for and who needed to pay him and by when. It was a lot for Mikey to take in, but he made sure to understand. 

After Bert left, he scrambled to his room and put the products away in his dresser draw. He made sure to hide them well. His mother was cool with many things, or maybe she just tried to ignore most of the things she thought her son was getting up to. She did that alot. She used to ignore when Gerard would smoke in his room or when she’d find inappropriate magazines lying around the boys rooms. Mikey knew she knew about it all because he’d see her picking up his buds and the magazine stacks would be stacked a little more neatly then when they had left them. Nonetheless, he made sure to hide them really well.

He shoved the bags in socks and put the socks under band tees that were hand-me-downs from Gerard. They were torn and tattered yet Gerard didn’t have the guts to throw them away and he didn’t have the room to take it. He left it with Mikey and Mikey had bitched about it because what was he gonna do with a bunch of old smelly Misfits shirts? Well, he knew now.

Mikey took a shower and made sure to brush his teeth again. He even popped a breathe mint. This was gonna be his first time doing it with Alicia in months. Most of the time they did it in junior year they were smoking weed in her room or a little buzzed from a party. This time it was going to be different. Maybe, just maybe Alicia would want to get back with Mikey. Maybe this was what it was all about. Mikey felt a sudden surge of excitement that was rare. Maybe, just maybe, if they got back together, Pete would notice Mikey.


	11. Some Of The Funniest Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabe being a good person for once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey Y'all! If you are still reading this, I wish I could hug you. Any who, Ima a little preoccupied with another fic, but this one shall not be forgotten! Also, if you have any ideas for this, lemme know. I have a general idea and the ending already written, but I wouldn't mind adding or rearranging things.

It was Monday before Mikey knew it. Gabe had rolled around and decided to be a good friend for once in his life. “Get in the car, Mikey Way!”, he yelled from his nasty truck. Mikey heard him all the way from inside the kitchen. Grant it, the window was open, but still, Gabe was a loud obnoxious kid. 

Ms.Way grimace. “That’s Gabe?”, she asked like she didn’t already know. She was sitting at the kitchen table, smoking and drinking her coffee. She didn’t work early on Mondays anymore. Or Tuesdays, or Thursdays. Just last week an apprentice at the Salon got promoted to a regular. Money was always kind of tight, but now the Ways were bracing for even more financial instability. 

“Yep”, Mikey sighed while grabbing his school bag. “I guess he’s giving me a ride”, Mikey shrugged. 

Ms.Way laughed. “And here I thought I could give you a ride to school now that I have more time in the mornings'', she said cheerfully, although Mikey could hear the sadness in her voice. It made Mikey’s heart hurt. It was one thing to console someone who was feeling down, but it was another thing to console your mother who was feeling ever more and more depressed ever since she split up with your alcoholic father when you were ten and your grandmother passed away when you just reached middle school. Mikey wanted to hug her, tell her he loved her, but he knew that if he did he’d cry, his emotionless exterior would crack and he’d be all out there. Then she’d feel bad and say she was being a bad mother, she’d start crying, and they’d both be crying. It would be a mess. So Instead, Mikey grabbed his shoes and hurried out the door.  
“Bye, Ma”, he said before closing the door. 

Gabe was sitting in his truck with his head in his arm. He had his typical smug look smeared on his face and was smirking. He proceeded to reer his engine. Vroom Vroom Vroom. “Hurry the fuck up, Mikeyway”, he complained. Mikey quickened his pace across the lawn. He opened the rusty metal gate that was shared with the weird neighbors and nearly sprinted into Gabe’s car.

“What is up, Mikeyway?”, Gabe asked, annunciating every syllable.

“Gabe, you look and sound like a fucking pedaphile”, he said, opening the front door. 

Gabe looked a little taken back by Mikey’s comment, but laughed anyway. “Who pissed on your cornflakes?”. Gabe turned the car sharply and Mikey almost hit the dashboard. He immediately put his seat belt on.

“Why are you picking me up?”, Mikey asked. Gabe usually didn’t pick anybody up for school. He actually took the bus himself due to his fear of hitting other cars.

Gabe’s eyes light up with mischief. “I just wanted to ask you some questions, about umm… Pete”, he started, a smile growing. He looked like this was some of the funniest shit in the world and was acting like he was playing a practical joke. 

“Shoot”, Mikey responded. 

“So, I’ve been hearing you bitch about Pete being a dick, blowing you off and shit right? And at lunch he’s been super enthawled with Patrick and the fucking Chicago kids. Which is like, yeah whatever, it’s excusable-”, Gabe swerved the car again, narrowly missing a minivan. “But he’s also starting to blow me and Frank off. I talked to Frank and apparently Pete is just MIA all the time. And whenever I hang out with him, he seems super wigged out, like I’m gonna beat him up or something. I don’t know, I just think something is up with him”.

Mikey blinked. He didn’t really understand what Gabe was going on about. Gabe was not very eloquent most of the time. He was obnoxious and scatter brained. “Sure”, Mikey responded because he didn’t really know how to respond any other way.

“So I was wondering… your mom works late on Fridays, right?”, Gabe asked. His eyes lit up again with mischief. 

“Yeah”.  
“Okay so on Friday, I’m gonna pick you up for school. Bring whatever illicit substances you can get your hands on”, Gabe instructed.

“Why? What the fuck are you planning, Gabe?”, Mikey asked, thoroughly confused. He was actually kind of scared. Gabe should not be left to plan things by himself. They turned out wonderfully terrible. 

“You don’t get to ask questions, Mikey”, Gabe replied sternly. He laughed a little to himself while pulling into the school parking lot. “Alright, now get the fuck out of my car. Also, remember, _Friday.”_


	12. Freak the Freak Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pete is a deabead and everyone part takes in embarasing Frank because that is what friends are for :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi!!! I wanted to thank who ever had stuck around this long! Also, thank you for all the people commenting, you give me motorvation! I took a short break from writting since I was working on my other fic, but I got bored of that so I'm coming back to this one.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday had passed in a big blur of old antics. It was the week before Frank’s sweet sixteen, so of course he was whining about that all week. Gabe threatened to shove Frank into a locker if he mentioned his birthday again. Frank shut up good. He pouted a lot on Wednesday because of it. Mikey had done some ‘deliveries’ for Bert and Bert had given him product to deliver on Friday as well as a twenty for all his ‘work’. It really was easy money. Mikey slipped the twenty into his mother’s wallet without her noticing. Pete was still sitting at the far end of the table, laughing his head off at whatever Patrick was saying. He didn’t even greet Mikey anymore at lunch or at the lockers. Hell, Mikey hadn’t even seen Pete at his locker since the one day Pete tackled him. Pete also rejoined the soccer team so he used that for his excuse on not hanging out after school. Mikey had even tried to talk to Pete in between classes and in the halls. Pete would just give a weird half smile, nod, then say he had to leave. Mikey was starting to get pissed. Pete was being a dick. 

Compared to the blandness of Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Thursday was spicy and hot. Mikey had started his day at his locker, as per usual, no Pete and lot’s of lugging books in and out of the locker. What had struck Mikey as unusual was the shrill giggle he heard from across the hall. Mikey immediately recognised the giggle as Frank’s, he was the only dude Mikey knew that giggle. Mikey looked over from his locker and saw Frank walking down the halls, holding his books and someone else’s. That’s when Mikey noticed the short brunette at his side. 

Mikey laughed. He was really, really tempted to yell something really embarrassing to Frank from across the hall. But, his better wits advised him not to as everyone would laugh at him and Frank would be pissed off. It would also squander any chances of him actually getting with Jamia. Nonetheless, he was still glad Frank and Jamia were getting along. Mikey almost felt proud of Frank.

Frank brought Jamia around to the lunch table. He introduced her to everybody and Pete actually paid attention to something other than Patrick for once. Mikey grinned at Frank, teeth and all. Gabe just gave Frank this smug know it all look and Frank blushed beat red. Frank gave Jamia his chair and walked off to find another chair. He secretly flipped both Gabe and Mikey off and they laughed.

“So, Jamia”, Gabe started vey smugly. Jamia just nodded, she was oblivious to Gabe’s antics even though Mikey could smell it from miles away.

“It’s really nice to meet you. You’re a… friend of Frank’s?”, Gabe inquired. 

“Uh, yeah. I have him in Chemistry'', Jamia replied. Mikey watched as Gabe nearly fell out of his chair holding back laughter, although he did have to admit, chemistry. It’s like they were meant for eachother. 

“I’m just suprise Frank was able to befriend anybody, he’s really interesting”, Mikey drawled while taking a bite out of an apple, because it was true, Frank had the humor of a middle schooler and the common sense of an ape. Sure, he could be charming when he wanted to be, but it was real hard for Frank to be nice for too long. He’d like explode. Jamia gave Mikey a strange look, almost like she was confused. “I mean he’s obnoxious and has an interesting sense of humor”, Mikey elaborated.

Jamia just laughed. “Yeah, he does have an interesting sense of humor. He’s funny though”, she said smiling. Her eyes were filled with life and she seemed a little nervous. She definitely likes Frank.

Frank walked back over with a chair and sat down next to Jamia and across from Gabe and Mikey. Frank looked at Jamia, then at Gabe and Mikey. His eyes got wide and he shook his head. “You have better not be talking shit about me”, he warned.

Gabe smiled and dismissively waved at Frank. “Nah, we weren’t saying anything bad”, Gabe said. “We're talking about your charming sense of humor and dashing charm”. Gabe threw a limp fry from his tray at Frank. It landed on his nose and caused Frank’s face to scrunch up.

“Screw you, Saporta. You think you’re so tough because you’re a foot taller than me. Well guess what? That just means you’re easier to tackle”, Frank joked.

“I bet you’d look like a falling girafe”, Mikey noted, taking another bite of his apple.

Gabe threw his hands up like he was being arrested. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. It’s not my fault you Italians are fucking short. I don’t know what the fuck they put in your fucking spageti sauce, but they obviously aren’t putting it in my empanadas”. Gabe picked up another limp french fry and ate it. He immediately grimaced. “Or maybe it’s the school lunches. They didn’t have these shitty lunches in the Big Apple”.

“Oh God, is Gabe talking about being from New York again, or is it Uruguay this time?”, Alicia asked as she stood behind Mikey’s chair. Everybody turned to her, she seemed to appear from thin air. 

“New York”, Frank answered dully. “Also,”, he perked back up. “Jamia this is Alicia, Alicia this is Jamia”.

“Nice to meet you Jamia'', she said waving and smiling. Jamia smiled back and nodded. She seemed a little quiet and shy. It was funny because Frank was totally smitten for this girl and she liked him and yet they seemed to be polar opposites. Mikey and Alicia were fairly different but not quite polar opposites. Alicia was a little louder and rebellious than Mikey, but they were both foolish and had similar sense of humor. Frank and Jamia just seemed so different, it might actually work.

“Hey Mikey, scoot over”, Alicia asked. “Pete invited Brendon Urie and Ryan Ross to sit with him and now all the chairs are gone”, she explained while sitting on Mikey’s chair. She crossed her leg over and put it on Mikey’s legs and put her arm around him. 

“Brendon Urie?”, Mikey asked. He shot a look down the other end of the table and saw Brendon and Ryan chatting away with Pete. He must have stared a little too long because Pete caught his eyes. They made eye contact for a while, both shooting each other looks. Pete looked a little apologetic, his bushy eyebrows were straight lines and his eyes seemed sad. Mikey thought he also sensed a little fear in Pete’s eyes, which was really weird for Pete. Mikey’s expression was simple ‘I’m mad at you’. Their eye contact was broken when Alicia threw both her arms around Mikey.

“Earth to Mikeyway”, Alicia said while squeezing his neck. Mikey gasped and almost fell out of his chair. 

“God, Ali, you trying to strangle me?”, Mikey asked while regaining his balance. 

Alicia grinned and then licked him, because Alicia has no shame and likes freaking new people out. In this case it was Jamia, and Mikey knew Frank would bitch about being embarrassed later but Mikey didn’t care as Alicia nuzzled herself into his neck. Mikey laughed and secretly wondered if Pete saw. He looked from the corner of his eyes to see if Pete saw. Pete was just looking down at his plate, shaking his head.  
Mikey turned back around just in time to see Gabe throw his empty coke can at Mikey. He was probably aiming for the back of his head, but ended up hitting him right in the face. 

“Gabe, what the fuck?”, Mikey asked while picking the can up.

“Can’t you to go get a fucking room or somthing?”. Gabe wrinkled his nose and scooted his chair further away from the two. “I don’t want to see you two fuck right in front of my face. I’m trying to eat lunch”, Gabe whined very dramatically. Gabe liked causing a scene and freaking new people out just as much as Alicia and Mikey. Mikey threw the coke right back at Gabe and Gabe pouted. 

“Shut up, Saporta. I bet you’d enjoy it”, Alicia quipped. Mikey threw an arm around Alicia. At this point they looked like a game of twister gone wrong where they just got tangled up. That would serve Pete right. Mikey wanted Pete to see that he was perfectly happy without Pete’s friendship and was in fact getting female compassion. 

Frank shook his head. He was real red in the face like a tomato. He shot Jamia an apologetic look, although Jamia seemed to be enjoying the bantar. Maybe she wasn’t as vanilla as she looked. She was super hilarious and cool under her soft exterior. That was probably the case. Shoot, Frank couldn’t be around genuinely good kids for too long. Jamia was probably cool as shit.

“Okay,” Mikey said when he saw Frank getting worked up. “We’ll all behave now”. Mikey unhooked his arm from around Alicia and Alicia got her face out of his neck because at the end of the day embarrassing Frank was fun but they really wanted Frank to get with Jamia. They were cute together. Frank was a sweetheart to Jamia and a major asshole to everybody else. They were practically meant for eachother.

“You might, but I sure as hell won’t”, Gabe said. It was true, Gabe could not stop being a dick, either that or he felt no need to change for anybody (which is why all his teachers hated him). You either went along with his jokes or you hated him. Gabe abruptly stood up. “It was nice to meet you, Jamia. As for the rest of you fuckers, good fucking bye, I’m going to bother some freshmen”. Gabe ran to the otherside of the cafeteria and nearly jumped into a chair at William Beckette and the other scrawny freshmen’s table. 

“I don’t know why Gabe likes harassing those freshmens all the time”, Frank said rolling his eyes and sneering at Gabe although it was clear he was glad Gabe had left. Gabe probably figured he couldn’t keep his mouth shut, so he just left. It was one of the most responsable things Gabe has ever done.

“I think he’s friends with them”, Mikey shrugged. Mikey knew everybody, but Gabe was friends with everybody. Either that or he hated you, there was no inbetween with Gabe. The freshmen seemed to like him, though. They were all laughing and throwing their empty milk cartons at Gabe. 

Frank laughed but still looked kind of tense. He gave Mikey a look. It was a ‘get-out-please’ look. He then looked at Jamia and smiled. Mikey took the hint.

“Hey, Alicia, you wanna go out for a smoke?”, Mikey asked. He faced Alicia and raised his eyebrows.

“Uh, yeah”, Alicia agreed, getting the hint as well. 

They got up and walked around the table, passing by Pete and his gang of kids. Pete actually looked at Mikey. He looked like he was going to stand up but instead just half stood.

“Hey, ah Mikey”, he stuttered. He looked really nervous. “Can we talk?”, he asked.

Mikey felt his heart jump. This is what he wanted. He wanted to talk to Pete, right? But he also felt angry. Why should he talk to Pete? Pete had been ignoring Mikey since school started, almost two months! Why should he talk to Pete. Mikey felt Alicia’s hand wrap around his and her piercing eyes.

“Sorry, Mikey can’t right now. We have to go do something”, she answered politely. Thank god for Alicia. She seemed to always know what Mikey was thinking and how to handle it.

“Do what?”, Pete asked aggressively.

“We’re gonna go fuck in the grils bathroom. You can talk to him later, Good Bye, Pete”, Alicia responded, losing her politeness and replacing it entirely with malice. “C’mon, Mikey. We don’t have all day”, she tugged at his arm and dragged him out the cafeteria.

Once out of the cafeteria, Mikey turned to Alicia. “Thank you so much for getting me out of that”, Mikey said. They continued walking towards the doors to the bleachers where they normally smoked when Alicia suddenly stopped and tugged Mikey’s hand.

“Yeah, no problem. Now, I know we said we were gonna smoke, but…? I wasn’t saying that just to save you. The girls bathroom is down the hall?”.

Mikey grinned. He didn’t know what he was feeling about Pete right now but he was sure he loved Alicia, not in love, but love as friends. Even if they weren’t _in love_ and were just a fling or fuck buddies or what ever, they were friends. Mikey and Alicia would always be friends.


	13. Dutch Ovens in Pennsylvania

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Who knew that driving to Pennsylvania when you were suppose to be in school to mend friendships was a good idea?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi it's way to early where i am. Please stay safe bbys

Friday morning was crisp and cold. Mikey came out of his room wearing a large denim jacket. It was starting to wear and tear with the amount of times he had worn it, which was almost everyday. His mother had already left for the salon, she worked long hours on Fridays. Mikey washed the coffee mug she left out and grabbed a bowl for his cereal. Just as he was sitting down at the table, he spotted Gabe’’s green truck. 

It was funny. Gabe’s truck was small. It wasn’t a truck-truck but it wasn’t exactly a car. It had a back instead of a trunk, but it was a very small truck. The kind that construction workers drive around with wood in the back. The truck was also an obnoxious shade of light forrest green but looked almost greyish because of how messed up it was. It had been petty roughed even when Gabe bought it for dirt cheap. Gabe’s family didn’t have much money, even less than the Ways and maybe even the Toro-Ortizs. Gabe’s father sold scarves back when they were living illegally in New York, _scarves_. They were slightly better off now, but still didn’t have much. To Gabe, the truck was freedom and the highest luxury. Even if it was fuck ugly and was older than Gabe himself, it was his pride and joy since he bought it. The thing about Gabe and his truck that was really funny was that it was almost as loud as he was, whether it be the horn or the rumbling sound it made.

Gabe honked his car horn the second he turned into the street. He must have honked at least thirty times. The neighbors would definitely be complaining about it later on. Mikey grabbed his school bag and rushed out of the house, cereal be damned. Hopefully Gabe would stop honking if he got out fast enough. He better, Mikey sacrificed his breakfast and his hair, which was all frizzy and unruly without the product he put to make it more flat. Luckily, Gabe stopped honking when he spotted Mikey. 

Gabe was sitting at the wheel as usual, tapping along the steering wheel and blasting a Bikini Kill cassette really loudly. He was mouthing the lyrics to ‘Rebel Girl’ and head banging. “Hey, Mikeyway. Get in”, Gabe instructed when he noticed Mikey.

Mikey hopped into the passenger seat confused. “Why are you picking me up?”, he asked. 

Gabe rolled his eyes. “Oh my god!”, he exclaimed in a valley girl accent. “I can’t believe you forgot! I totally said I was picking you up on Friday! Oh my god!”, he gawked while speeding out of the street. Mikey just sat there in the passenger's seat, thoroughly confused. The combination of Bikini Kill, the speed of the car, and Gabe talking in a valley girl accent was slowing down Mikey’s thought process.

Mikey picked through his brain. Hmm, Gabe had said something about picking Mikey up on Friday. The week had passed so quickly that Mikey just forgot. Mikey sighed with defeat and sunk into the front seat. He watched Gabe talk to himself and struggle to take the cassette out. Gabe managed to get the Bikini Kill cassette out and he accidently threw it across the car. 

“Shit!”, Gabe cursed, still keeping his eyes on the road. He slowed the car down a little. “I hope that’s not broken”. Gabe fumbled a little over the radio knobs before settling on a radio station. They were playing Madonna. “I love Madonna”, Gabe said, either to Mikey or just himself.

Gabe continued to speed and zig-zag inbetween cars for a good ten minutes before Mikey realized they were heading in the opposite direction from the school. Mikey looked out the window and was greeted with large single family homes and mowed gardens. Holy shit, this was Pete’s neighborhood.

“Gabe, what are we doing here?”,Mikey frantically asked, although he already knew what Gabe was doing.

“We’re picking Pete up, dumb ass”, Gabe replied all ‘duh’ like. He even did the head quirk thing.

“Why?”, Mikey demanded. Wasn’t Gabe pissed at Pete? Wasn’t everyone pissed at Pete?.

“Cause I’m giving him a ride”, Gabe responded very ‘duh’ like again. Gabe could really radiate asshole energy at times. It took a special kind of person to fully enjoy his presence. 

Mikey rolled his eyes. That’s not what he ment, and Gabe knew it. Gabe was just playing around again but Mikey wasn’t playing around today.

“That’s not what I meant, Gabe”, Mikey reiterated. Gabe didn’t respond, instead his smile grew by a trifold. Mikey sighed as sunk further in his seat as they approached Pete’s house.

“Look”, Gabe said. His stupid grin had washed off and his eyes seemed more focused on the road. For once in his life he looked serious. “I’m Jenny Jones-ing this shit. I’m sick and tired of the way Pete’s been acting. I’m fucking serious!”, he exclaimed when he caught Mikey’s indecrelious look. “I’m fucking serious”, he pointed a finger at Mikey. “I’m gonna fix this mess”.

Mikey stopped himself from rolling his eyes, because, yeah, what was _Gabe_ going to do? Sure, Mikey appreciated the effort on Gabe’s part, but really, what was Gabe gonna do that was going to bring Pete around? Pete was being a jerk. That’s all there was to it.

“I know you’re thinking ‘what’s Gabe planning?’ and let me tell you, it’s gonna be good”, Gabe smirked. Mikey thinks Gabe was trying to make him feel better, but it just made him feel frightened. Because, oh god, what was Gabe planning?

Gabe pulled up to Pete’s curb. Mikey scoffed as he looked at Pete’s home. It wasn’t fair that some people were born into money when others weren’t. Both Pete’s parents worked good jobs and got paid well and it showed. They had a nice home, nice yard, and what they thought were nice children. It was the American dream. Mikey was a little bitter, just a little. How could he not be when everyone else was struggling while Pete was living it up and still being a massive dick? Mikey spent hours alone with a dead grandmother, Gerard in college, and never saw his mother working long hours while his father was off drinking miles down south. Frank was nearly as lonely with a very Chatlioc mother (bless her heart, she really did love him but just couldn’t understand) and a sort-of-around father. The Toro’s shared a two bedroom apartment between five members and Ray casually complained about being woken up by ambulances pumping out heroin addict’s stomachs. Gabe used to be fucking illegal and lived off of whatever his father made from selling scarves. The list goes on. Mikey hears rumors about Andy’s mispent early teens and the freshmans Pete and Gabe hang out with all had issues. And guess fucking what? None of them were dicks. Pete had a nice home and family and was a dick. It didn’t make any sense to Mikey.

“Hey”, was all he said when he got into the car.

Gabe honked his horn obnoxiously as he did normally. Gabe should not be trusted with devices capable of making loud noises. He just should not.

Pete stumbled out his house. His bookbag was barley slung on his shoulder and he looked quite disheveled. He made it out to Gabe’s car and opened the door widely. 

“What’s up Wentz?”, Gabe asked like nothing was wrong.

“Not much”, Pete replied casually. Nobody said anything else and instead decided to bask in the tension. Pete sighed and closed his eyes. 

The car remained relatively quiet for ten minutes with the exception of Gabe’s radio. He decided to turn on the Latin station and was singing very obnoxiously to a song. Between the tension and Gabe’s singing, Mikey wanted to jump out of the car and hit the highway pavement. He reminded himself that they were going to be at school soon before looking out the window and realizing that they were far far away from the school.

“Gabe, where the fuck are we going?”, Mikey asked a little pissed off.

Gabe just grinned. He didn’t respond and continued singing obnoxiously. Mikey didn’t know how Pete could sleep through Gabe’s singing. The sad part is Gabe could actually sing well if he wanted to. He just didn’t want to. After two torturous minutes the song finally ended, Mikey turned the radio off and slapped Gabe’s hand when he tried to turn the radio back on. 

“Gabe, where are we going?”, Mikey repeated. He was very somber and serious. He wasn’t playing.

Gabe rolled his eyes. “We are going to one of the best places”, he started. Mikey waited for him to continue but soon realized that Gabe wasn’t planning on elaborating. He sighed back into the seat and closed his eyes, he didn’t realize how tired he was. Before he knew it, he was out like a light.

After the car hit a rock or a pot hole or something, it jerked up and hit the ground roughly. Mikey got thrown out of sleep by the comotion. He looked around, they were still driving, which was a good sign.

“Gabe what the hell?”, Mikey yelled.

Gabe shrugged. “It was a pothole. Both of you can go back to sleep”.

Mikey rolled his eyes. He wasn’t going to sleep. He didn’t even know how long he had been asleep. Mikey looked out the window. He coulda sworn that the sun wasn’t that high when he first got in the car.

“Gabe where are we?”, Mikey asked. Gabe didn’t respond.

“ _Gabe_ ”, Mikey warned, getting more and more pissed.

Gabe remained silent. Mikey looked through the rearview mirror and caught Pete’s expression. He looked just as pissed off and confused as Mikey felt. Pete and Mikey made quick eye contact through the mirror before Mikey quickly looked away. It was obvious, the tension between them was so apparent.

“Gabe tell us where you are going right fucking now or else I swear I will slash your tires”, Pete spoke up for the first time in about thirty minutes. Mikey was actually shocked. He thought that Pete was going for the silent treatment. 

“Ugh, fine. I was planning on going to the middle of fuck no where. Shit, I might have even been planning on driving to Pennsylvania! All I know is you two need to fix whatever is going on! I figured driving out to the middle of nowhere, smoking a few joints, and having some beers would fix your issues. I was gonna Jenny Jones it!”, Gabe yelled in typical Gabe manner.

Mikey nor Pete responded. Mikey decided to stare out the window and ignore both Pete and Gabe. After a few more minutes, Mikey felt a sudden jerk and heard the car screech. He nearly hit the dashboard.

“What the fuck!”.

Gabe pulled into a McDonald's parking lot and nearly hit five cars by the time he parked in the parking lot. He looked angry. He genuinely looked angry. He opened the front door and hoped out of his truck. Mikey and Pete sat in the car in silence, watching other cars drive by the McDonalds. Mikey had no plans on breaking the silence. He was mad at Pete. Pete was being such a jerk.

Gabe eventually returned with a case of beer and pack of cigarettes. He must have had them in his trunk. He slammed the door close and grabbed the keys out of the truck. Mikey watched Gabe curiously as Gabe busted open the beer case and pulled a bottle opener from his pocket. He handed it to Pete before opening another for Mikey then one for himself.

“Look,” Gabe started. “There is something going on. I know that there is something going on between the two of you. I can sense it”. Gabe took a large gulp of beer. “I know there is something going on. So let’s just hear it. I’ll be the referee or whatever”. When Gabe realized nobody was going to budge, Gabe sighed and continued monologuing. “Pete, why have you been ignoring everybody?”, Gabe asked solemnly.

Pete’s eyes turned large and he raised his eyebrows. He looked like a deer caught in headlights. He was asked the million dollar question, after all. Pete crossed his arms and slouched. “I’m not ignoring anybody”, he responded. Mikey knew it was a lie. Pete knew it was a lie. Even Gabe knew it was a lie.

“Bullshit Pete”, Gabe responded. 

“Look there isn’t a reason I’ve been avoiding Mikey- I mean everybody”, Pete quickly realized his mistake. He really looked surprised now. His cheeks were rosy and his eyes were plates.  
“I’ve just not been feeling alright recently”, Peter answered a little less defensively. 

“Okay… care to elaborate?”, Gabe asked.

“No”.

“Okay… then Mikey… What’s your take to this?”.

Mikey sighed. He really didn’t want to talk about it. Plus, he knew that Pete was not letting on to all of it. He was definitely hiding something. Instead of pressing Pete for more information, he answered Gabe’s question.

“I’ve tried to talk to Pete and reach out”, Mikey started calmly. It was true. “He just doesn’t want to talk or hang around anymore. That’s fine.”

“That’s not true!”, Pete interjected. “I tried talking to you yesterday but you totally avoided me!”.

“Well, I was busy with Alicia!”, Mikey responded snarkily.

“No shit, Mikey”, Pete scoffed.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”.

“I saw you at lunch yesterday, all tangled up with her.”

“Why are you being so pissy about it?”, Mikey spat, even though he was oddly happy that Pete didn’t like it. Maybe, just maybe he was jealous.

“Well like, we all know that Alicia is a total slut. It’s kind of embarrassing that your girlfriend or whatever she is has slept with more people than you have”.

“Don’t fucking call her a slut”, Mikey growled. He knew Alicia slept around a lot over the summers but his mama taught him not to call a girl a slut, even if she was one.

“Why? You getting upset because I insulted your little girlfriend?”.

“First of all she’s not my girlfriend, second of all you shouldn’t call _anyone_ a slut”.

“Then why do you hang around her so much? You sure act like your dating?”.

“Why the fuck does it matter to you? Why do you care?”

Pete flinched. He looked taken back. He seemed shocked, like he truly didn’t know why he cared.

“Because you _always_ go back to her”.

“So what? Really Pete, who cares if I’m fucking Alicia or not? I could date her, mary her, or hate her and it shouldn’t fucking matter to you”. He didn’t know why he said that, it really did matter. “If you were a true friend, you wouldn’t care if I was a virgin or if I had five divorced wives. You’d still be there. But you’re not. You’re not even around anymore. You’re always with fucking Patrick. I swear, you two propably fuck more than me and Alicia”.

Pete got real beat red. He was mad. “Shut the fuck up Mikey! I’m not gay. I am NOT fucking gay! Do you fucking hear me?”, he seethed, completely changing from his mildly annoyed and arrogant manner to something Mikey never had quite seen before.

It was like Mikey had struck the wrong chord. He was just being a dick with the Patrick comment. He knew they weren’t fucking. Pete was like the straitiest guy Mikey knew.

The car went quiet. It was as if Mickey's coment had broken something in Pete. Surprisingly it was Gabe, who had stayed quiet during the whole interaction, that broke the silence.

“God damn, I try to bring back two of my friends together because I see that they’re stuggling so I fucking drive us out to the middle of fuck Pensylvania to do drugs and talk things out or what ever the fuck they do in chick flicks and then this is what happens! I’d make a shitty therapist”.

“Well nobody asked you to, Gabe”, Pete spat.

“Well at least Gabe fucking cares about years of friendship”, Mikey spat right back. They rode three hours home in silence.


	14. Mix Ups and Trip Ups

Mikey was exhausted when he got home. All he wanted to do was run up to his room and sleep after the events of the day. Who knew that having an argument in the middle of Pennsylvania would make you so tired? Or... maybe it was the weed that Gabe and Mikey smoked after Gabe dropped Pete off. Mikey had trudged up the way to his door and jammed his key in the door knob. After some fiddling with the key, he opened the door, ready to run to his room and sleep before his mom got back. Needless to say, he was shocked to see Bert Mckraken sitting on his living room couch. He was just sitting there like he lived there, watching the television. 

“Bert?”, Mikey asked, confused.

Bert turned his head to look at Mikey. He smiled a little. He looked very dopey and stupid, like a seven year old kid when they get an icecream cone from an icecream truck. “Oh hey, Mikey”, he greeted.

“Uh, what are you doing in my house?”, Mikey asked without much intonitian.

Bert laughed. No, more like he cackled. Bert cackled like a pimple-infested witch. “I was just visiting Gerard, that’s all”, he said like it would clear up any confusion.

“Umm… Gerard’s here?”, Mikey kind of slurred. He looked out the window in the door and saw that Gerard’s car was in fact parked on the other side of the street. He must have not noticed it. “Huh, I guess he is”.

“ He called me that he was staying the weekend down here. He’s in the shower right now.”

“Why would Gerard need to shower? He just got here”, Mikey trailed.

“Why do you think he’d shower?”, Bert asked, a little snarkily.

“Oh”, was all Mikey said. He put his school bag down and took off his jean jacket. He’d need to leave it outside since it stunk as a result from hot boxing Gabe’s car. Shoot, maybe he could even use a shower if he planned on being in the presence of his mother any time soon. Mikey made his way to the stairs to go to his room when Bert suddenly stood up.

“So… uh, do you have the money?”. Bert slowly made his way towards Mikey. Mikey furrowed his eyebrows before being hit with a relazation.

Shit, Mikey totally forgot that he was supposed to make some deliveries today. He actually completely forgot that Gabe was planning something. Mikey stared down at Bert. His eyes were glowing and he seemed a little crazed. 

“Sorry man, I forgot-”

“Forgot? God damn, how do you forget?”, Bert interrupted.

“I wasn’t at school”, Mikey explained. “I’ll have it for you by Monday afternoon. It was a mix up, I’m sorry”.

Bert’s face contorted into something that Mikey assumed was a mixture between anger and frustration. “I’ll let it slide, but just know, I like things _on time_ ”, Bert growled. He took a few steps away from Mikey. 

“Hey!”, Gerard called from the top of the stairs. He was wearing pajamas and had freshly washed hair. “Hey, Mikey!”, he said a little too loudly. He laughed a little before running down the stairs and flinging himself onto Mikey.

Mikey almost fell from the impact but instead stumbled a few feet back. He managed to catch Bert’s eyes as he was returning Gerard’s hug. Bert was standing there smiling, like nothing had happened before. 

“Hey, Gee”, Mikey muffled, squished in Gerard’s arms.

Gerard pulled back. He was grinning and his eyes were bright and slightly out of focus. “It’s Mikey”, he kind of squeaked. He then hugged him again and put his head on Mikey’s shoulder. He inhaled a little. “God, Mikey. Are you high?”, he interrogated, pulling back to look at his brother. He gave Mikey a disapproving look before ruffling his hair.

“Are _you_ high?”, Mikey shot back because Gerard was acting weird. Gerard looked down a little, as if he was shocked that Mikey could tell and stepped back. They all stood like that for a few seconds in silence before it became clear that Gerard was not going to answer. “Gabe gave me a ride home and he was smoking weed during eight period, that’s why I smell like it”, Mikey lied, hoping to break the awkward silence. Gerard seemed to take it, even if he was a bit apprehensive.

“Alright”, Gerard replied. “Bert and I are going to be downstairs for a while before Mom comes home. Make sure to knock before coming down”, he finished while going down the basement.

Mikey felt a surge of anger briefly wash over him. What was Gerard hiding from him? Then he realized that he didn’t care. He didn’t care what was going on in that basement. He didn’t care that Pete was having a freak out of some sorts and was taking it out on his friends. He didn’t care that his attendance record was horrendous. He didn’t care that Gerard was being a hypocrite for judging Mikey when Gerard was clearly high off of actual drugs, not just weed. He didn’t care. Maybe he’d care later but not right now. All he wanted to do was sleep.


	15. Everything's Changing When I Turn Around

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little game of catch up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apoligize for not updadting sooner. I am/was distracted with something else but I decided to post this. This is lowkey filler/ catch-up but I really wanted to just move on to some more intresting things in the story rather than prolong the story and write about the month of November. I have some more dramatic stuff up next, so plz keep in tune :)

The next month was a little chaotic. Bert had been constantly hanging around where Mikey was, sneaking angry glances before stalking off. He kept on coming by his house too, giving him more and more product. It was actually absurd the amount of drugs Bert was asking to be pushed. He asked for thirty deliveries to be made per week. That was seven kids a day and that was too much scrambling in the hallways for Mikey to like. It was still manageable but Mikey was showing up to most of his classes late. If it wasn’t for the money he was making, he wouldn’t do it.

It wasn’t much money. He made about fifty dollars a week from Bert, which would be great if he kept it. He always gives his mother forty dollars. Always. He’d slip in a ten in her wallet every few days or he’d leave some fives in her bedroom, hoping she wouldn’t question the extra cash laying around. Mikey knew his mother was struggling. All the extra shifts she had taken in November were proof of it. They were struggling financially, and it wasn’t a secret.

He’d save the other ten for himself. He used it on dumb things, usually cigarettes, CDs, and sometimes pot. The pot was mostly because he was hanging out alot more with Frank. Pete completely stopped sitting at their lunch table. Him and Patrick were nowhere to be seen. Instead, Joe and Andy score further up the table and begin talking with Mikey, Frank, Gabe, Alicia, and Jamia, although outside of school they hangout with Pete and Patrick. Gabe started hanging out alot with the other freshmen kids outside of school, leaving Mikey and Frank to fend for themselves most of the time. 

The only thing saving Mikey over the last month was the times he spent with Frank and Alicia. Alicia had been hanging around with Mikey a lot more, but they weren’t really dating. They might have been together, maybe, Mikey never asked. It didn’t feel like they were dating, not like in freshman or sophomore year. They just felt like friends hanging out. Maybe that’s what they were, just friends who happened to kiss sometimes. Whatever they were, they were hanging out alot and Mikey didn’t object. It was nice to talk to Alicia again without the brief awkwardness of post-break ups or the sexual tension of junior year. It was nice, no labels, just friendship. 

Jamia actually had seemed to take a liking to Frank. It was odd. They got along really well. Frank was a gentleman to Jamia, he was actually nice. Jamia also proved to have a little more spark than Mikey originally thought she had. She would frequently tease Frank or say something wickedly funny. Her and Alicia seemed to get along well. Whenever the four of them all hung out, the girls would go to the bathrooms together and come back laughing their heads off. Everything seemed to be going okay, just okay, but nobody could deny that there was an awkward silence during conversations without Pete.

December came, and just in time. Mikey foolishly thought that if December came, things would get better. Like things would ever work out for Mikey Way. But who knows? Maybe his mother would get her normal chair back and money wouldn’t be an issue anymore. Maybe Bert would tell him that he found another guy to deliver to the high school. Maybe Mikey could start getting to classes on time. Maybe Pete would bite the bullet and approach Mikey and they’d actually talk it out, unlike that weird experience in Gabe’s car when Pete was acting really immature. Maybe everything would be okay. Maybe.  
It was a week before Christmas break when Mikey was walking the halls, a few minutes after he was supposed to be in English. He knew he should be in class, working on another project with Alicia. Rossi had devoted Fridays for projects since many kids wouldn’t bother doing them outside of class. Alicia was used to him being a few minutes late, but she’d get pissed if he was any latter. Mikey did not want to be any latter, but this kid he was supposed to meet by the locker 264 was not here. 

Mikey thinks his name is Quin or something. He was a white kid with long blonde hair and a big nose. He was a few inches shorter than Mikey but definitely taller than Frank or Pete. God! Don’t think about Pete! Okay, this Quin kid was taller than Frank, just Frank. He was a little on the scrawny side, but he looked very scrappy, like he was the type to pull out a knife in a fist fight. Quin was also a major asshole. Mikey had only delivered three times to Quin, but each time Quin managed to give major asshole vibes. Him being late today was another sign of his assholry.

Mikey sighed and leaned against the wall, he really just wanted the kid to hurry up so he could go to class. Mikey was tired of kids like Quin, the inconsiderate and rude ones that he had to put up with. Mikey knew he couldn’t just go to class. Bert would be up his ass, asking why he pissed off a customer, why Mikey didn’t have his money. Bert was a nice guy when you caught him on a good day, but he could occasionally have his moments, especially when it came to money. Mikey didn’t want to mess with Bert when Bert didn’t have his money. It would not go well.

Mikey stood on the wall, waiting, for about ten minutes when Quin finally decided to roll around. Mikey saw him at the end of the hall, talking to a girl and taking his sweet time walking down. Mikey rolled his eyes, he really wished he could tell Quin to hurry his ass up, but that would just cause unnecessary problems and upset the ‘customers’ or whatever Bert would say when word got back around. Eventually the girl went into a classroom and Quin continued walking down the hall which was empty now.

“Hey”, Quin said when he eventually made his way over. 

Mikey rolled his eyes. He was sort of annoyed. He was going to be extremely late for class, possibly get detention, and piss Alicia off, all because some gangly stoner kid decided to waste his time. Mikey was also a little annoyed at Bert. It seemed like every week a new ‘customer’ was added to Mikey’s lists of deliveries. Quite honestly, Mikey was starting to question if the fifty dollars was worth it, Bert was making most of the profit and it seemed like Mikey was doing the most work. 

“You have a problem with me?”, Quinn demanded after seeing Mikey’s eye roll. Quinn puffed his skinny little chest and raised his eyebrows. Now that Mikey was looking down at Quin he realized that he was so much taller than Quin, who was 5’6 max, not even that probably. Quin sure had an attitude for someone who was the height and weight of a middle school girl.

“Can you come on time next week?”, Mikey asked, keeping all emotion out of his voice, as was his signature.

Quin scrunched his nose like he smelled something gross. “What”, he said, his arms swaying side by side. “You have someplace to be?”, he challenged.

Mikey crossed his arms. “Um, yeah, class?”.

It was Quin’s turn to roll his eyes. “God damn, I didn’t know Bert hired nerds as pushers”, Quin murmured under his breath while fishing one handly through his pockets. He pulled out a tattered brown wallet and started to pull out some bills. Mikey suddenly realized how terrible of an idea it was to exchange drugs in the middle of a hallway. It was better when there were tons of kids roaming around, but it was super obvious when there was nobody in the hallways. Just another reason why Quin should have come early. 

“What ever, just try and come on time”, Mikey dead panned while taking the bills. He drew the bag of weed from his pocket and slapped it into Quin’s hand a little harder than he had too. He really was annoyed.

Quin gave Mikey a dirty look, the dirtiest he could possibly muster, before walking away. Mikey rolled his eyes and walked to class. He really didn’t get paid enough to deal with this.


	16. Get Busy Dying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A fun flash back and some concerning news

A few days after the Quin incident, Mikey found himself watching ShawShank Redemption with Frank. Frank’s mom was out at her book club for the next few hours, so naturally Frank had gotten a pack of cigarettes out and started chain smoking them right in his living room. Mikey though he was being stupid, Ms.Iero was no fool, she’d sniff out the smoke even if the window was open. Frank had just waved him off though, he said he had done it before. Mikey rolled his eyes and just watched the movie, grabbing Frank’s cigarette every now and then for a drag.

They were on the part of the movie when Andy had just gotten out of solitary confinement for two months. Mikey watched intently as Andy muttered the infamous line to Red, “Get busy living or get busy dying”. Mikey felt a little bitter as he remembered the first time he watched ShawShank Redemption. He was with Pete.

_1995_

_Pete had seen the movie about a thousand times when it was out in theaters. He had tried to get Mikey to go with him, but Mikey couldn’t as he was grounded for getting one to many detentions (apparently smoking in the school bathroom wasn’t slick). Mikey didn’t mind too much the grounding, he was preoccupied listening to Gerard complain about his ex-girlfriend. Still, Mikey wished he could go. Pete decided to go see it with Joe and Andy._

_It was the end of the freshmen school year when Mikey managed to get his hands on the tape. He had been on ebay, trying to sell his tapes, when he spotted a copy of the film. He decided to set aside some money from the Pumpkins and buy it for Pete’s birthday. It had come in the mail about two weeks after Pete’s sixteenth birthday, but it was fine, Pete still bore a large smile when he opened the gift._

_They had gone to Pete’s house that night and watched the movie in Pete’s room. Back in Pete’s freshmen year, he was a major stoner. That’s actually probably where Frank learnt it from. Pete didn’t smoke as much any more, but back then he was a pot chimney. They hadn’t even made it past the open scene when Pete decided to roll a joint. It was only Mikey’s third time getting high (Gerard would kill him if he found out his little brother was smoking wacky tacky), so after a few hits he was feeling woozy._

_They watched the movie, all two and a half hours of it, without a word from Pete. Pete was usually talkative, even during movies which was extremely annoying, so this struck Mikey as odd, even in his impared state. Mikey turned to face Pete when the credits rolled around. Pete’s eyes weren’t droopy and watery like they normally were when he was high on pot. Instead they were buggy, dry, and red. Pete looked at Mikey intently and Mikey looked back, a little scared at what was going on in Pete’s brain. They stared at each other silently for a while until Pete finally broke the silence._

_“I love that quote. ‘Get busy living or get busy dying’. It makes me wonder if I’m wasting my life and if I am if it’s just a bad as dying. I want to live, you know? Not survive, I want to live. I don’t want to be busy dying. I’m gonna get busy living”. Pete layed down on the bed. Mikey just blinked at him, confused and worried. Pete laughed at Mikey. He grabbed his hand and pulled Mikey next to him._

_”You’re scaring me, Pete”, Mikey whispered. They were staring at each other. Mikey was really starting to get worried. Pete could say some weird things before he did somthing stupid. Pete laughed at Mikey’s comment. He pecked Mikey’s lips. Mikey jerked back immediately. He didn’t know what was going on. Pete had never kissed him before_.

_“What are you doing, Pete?”, Mikey asked, a little horrified. He had only ever kissed Alicia before that. He didn’t like the way his stomach did the same butterfly thing that happened when he kissed Alicia before they broke up. It was too similar. Mikey didn’t know if he liked it or if he hated it for liking it._

_“Just kissing you”, Pete shrugged, like it was nothing. He laughed at Mikey like he was the funniest thing ever. Maybe it was the weed. Mikey scrunched up his eyebrows in confusion, a habit he got from Gerard. Pete just laughed more. “We should kiss in front of the lunch table tomorrow. It’ll be funny”, Pete laughed._

_Mikey laughed a little. “Won’t we get our asses kicked by bullies or some shit?”, he asked. They were scrawny freshmens after all. Pete just rolled his eyes. “No, not if we kiss very sneakily. It’ll be funny. Gabe will lose his shit. And Andy, real life Andy, not Andy from the movie, he’ll get so grossed out! It’ll be so funny! We should do it!”, Pete egged on. Mikey stood silent for a moment, thinking it over. Pete seemed to grow worried, so he added, “Unless it’s too early, I mean I know you and Alicia just broke up-”_

__“No, it shouldn’t be an issue if it’s just a joke. It’s just a joke and it’ll be funny”, Mikey finished. He had to admit, it’ll be funny to see everyone’s reactions. Pete nodded his head although he looked a little crestfallen._ _

___“Yeah, it’ll be just a joke. It’ll be funny”, Pete finally said._ _ _

___He rolled off his bed and fell, causing both boys to laugh their heads off until Pete’s mother knocked on the door. Pete freaked out. His mother was Jamacan, she knew the scent of weed. Pete hoped that the towel under the door would work and she'd go away after he insisted they were fine. She eventually left and the boys laughed again until Mikey had to go home._._ _

__“The first time I watched this movie was with Pete”, Mikey murmured. Frank turned to face Mikey. His eyes were wide with concern, like a mother when her child falls. Frank awkwardly shifted from his spot on the couch._ _

__“Pete?”, Frank asked like it was a name he barely remembered._ _

__“Yeah, Pete. We were also high, I was so high. This movie just reminds me of him”, Mikey trailed, still watching the movie._ _

__“We can watch something else, if it bothers you. I got some Japanese horror movies from Gerard the last time he was here. We can watch that instead”, Frank offered, his eyes still wide and his hand already on the tv remote. Mikey had told Hank about the Pennsylvania incident and Frank had immediately pulled Mikey into a hug. Frank was kind of treating Mikey like when Mikey and Alicia first broke up, very comforting and soft. Mikey didn’t know why. Him and Pete never dated. They were just friends having a fall out._ _

__Mikey shook his head. It didn’t bother him too much. Sure, it was sad to remember all the good times with Pete, but he wasn’t going to cry over it. Mikey had accepted the fact that Pete was most likely not a part of his life anymore._ _

__“It’s okay, it doesn't bother me, Mikey responded. Frank nodded and they returned to watching the movie._ _

__About thirty minutes later when the movie was almost over, Frank’s landline rang. Frank rolled his eyes and hopped off the couch. He disappeared into the kitchen, where the phone was. Mikey didn’t pay it no attention until he heard Frank’s muffled yet angry voice._ _

__“No, you can’t talk to him”, Frank snarled._ _

__Mikey’s head jerked into the direction of Frank’s kitchen. He slowly stood up from the couch and walked towards the kitchen. He saw Frank gripping the landline agirly, his nose was flared and his hand was on his hip. Mikey hung around the kitchen doorway, making his presence known._ _

__“I don’t care. I really don’t give a shit. He’s not our responsibility. I told you, I don’t know anything and neither does Mikey… No! I told you, you can’t talk to Mikey! Why? Did you even hear about what happened with Gabe? Nobody told you? Well isn’t that funny?”, Frank sarcastically said. He stood quietly for a while, listing to the other end and tapping on the kitchen counter. Mikey walked into the kitchen and sat down on the counter next to Frank, confused as ever._ _

__“You keep saying that and I’ll kick your ass”._ _

__Frank looked up at Mikey with apologetic eyes. Mikey gave Frank a shy smile, not quite aware of what was going on. All of a sudden, the murmured voice on the other line rose dramatically and Frank jumped a bit. Mikey laughed and ruffled Frank’s hair. Frank shook his head and stuck his tongue out. Frank listened to the other line for a few more seconds before growing red in the face. Mikey wondered what was going on._ _

__“I don’t give a shit”, Frank deadpanned before slamming the phone back onto the wall. His face was like a tomato and he was seething. “Fucking Freshmen”, Frank cursed._ _

__Mikey hopped off the counter quickly. He stood behind Frank and put his hand on Frank’s shoulder. Mikey knew how to calm Frank down after years of knowing him. “Frank, what’s going on?”, Mikey asked calmly. “Who called you?”._ _

__Frank shook his head. “It was fucking Patrick”, Frank sethed. Mikey stepped back a little, a little concerned. From what Mikey knew, Frank actually got along with Patrick quite well, unlike Mikey himself. They had hung out a few times back in September._ _

__“What did Patrick say?”. Mikey stepped back and leaned against the wall, giving Frank some space._ _

__Frank rolled his eyes before walking around. He took a drag of his cigarette before sitting down at the Kitchen table. “Patrick was just being a dick. Accusing us… Well you... of setting Pete off on some sort of rampage? I don’t know, Patrick wouldn’t tell me anything, he just kept on saying that it was your fault. He apparently tried to call your landline but it went to the answering machine so he tried calling me, thinking you were here”, Frank explained, looking down and fumbling with his hands. He looked guilty, like he was hiding something._ _

__Mikey raised his eyebrows and puffed his lip with suspicion. “Did he say anything more about the rampage?”, Mikey asked. He saw Frank wince and knew he hit the target. Something was up._ _

__Frank looked like a real quest, like he was debating saying something he knew he shouldn’t. Or like he was trying to figure out how to explain a big horrible concept to a small innocent kid. Or like somebody put a gun to his head and said, ‘if you don’t say this I’ll shoot you’ but he really didn’t want to say it._ _

__Mikey switched to the offense, no longer prioritizing comforting Frank. Instead, he crossed his arms and slouched, trying to look as tough and intimidating as possible. He lowered his gaze to Frank and gave Frank a piercing look. Frank looked up once to make eye contact with Mikey before immediately shooting his gaze back down._ _

__“Frank, you know something. Tell me”, Mikey growled._ _

__Frank finally looked up after a good two minutes. He looked like a lost puppy. He scratched his neck and gave Mikey a nervous half smile that he reserved only for when he was really in trouble._ _

__“Mikey, Pete’s gone missing”._ _


	17. I Want It That Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tell me why?  
> Ain't nothing but a heart ache  
> Tell me why?  
> Ain't nothig but a mistake  
> Tell me WHy?  
> I NeVeR wAnNa HeAr u sAy
> 
> I WANT IT THAT WAY

Mikey walked home that night and they didn’t finnish the movie. Frank seemed to understand. He offered to drive Mikey back home even though he didn’t even have his license yet. Mikey didn’t trust himself behind a wheel, much less Frank, so he opted to walk. It might also do him some good to be left alone with his thoughts. 

When Mikey got home, he ignored his mother’s questioning looks. She must have thought it was weird seeing him so back early, he usually stayed the night at Frank’s house, even on school nights. Mikey hurried to his room before she could ask. He really didn’t want to explain the new information he just found out.

Mikey didn’t even bother to change into pajamas or anything. He just brushed his teeth before flopping on his bed and staring at the ceiling. Maybe if he had more energy he’d force himself to at least put on some music, but he really didn’t want to get up again. All he wanted to do was stare at the dusty cobweb infested ceiling and think.

Patrick seemed pretty adamant that Mikey had known something or at least had a part in why Pete had just up and left. Maybe Pete told Patrick something that he didn’t tell anyone else. They were close. Mikey started to wonder if maybe he really did have something to do with Pete’s disappearance. Maybe it _was_ the car drive.

Maybe if Mikey hadn’t been so passive agressive in the car, they would have actually been able to talk about it. Maybe if Mikey had asked Pete what was wrong in the car, they would have gotten over it. Maybe if Mikey had talked to Pete before the car, back when he was with Alicia, they would have sorted things out. Maybe if Mikey hadn’t been rude to Pete when Pete stopped talking to him, Pete would have told Mikey what was wrong. Maybe instead of getting mad at Pete, Mikey should have worried more about Pete. Maybe if Mikey had asked Pete what was up back when Pete first started acting weird, Mikey wouldn’t have to think about this now. Maybe, just maybe.

***

The next day at school, Mikey felt terrible. He hadn’t gotten much sleep thinking about all the maybes and what ifs and worrying about Pete. Pete could do really stupid things when upset. Mikey also had the lurking feeling in his gut that something bad was going to happen. He turned through the halls, walking aimlessly because the bus had come early, with a pit in his stomach.

He wished the bus came late. The bus normally took these odd back roads that takes you on a highway that runs to the tip of Maine. Pete used to call the windy roads ShawShank roads because they took you up north and ShawShank was in Maine. But today the bust took the quick route, leaving extra time for Mikey to make Bert’s deliveries and walk around.

Right when the morning bell was about to ring and Mikey was about to turn into the hallway where his trig class was, Mikey spotted a head of ginger hair. Mikey knew who it was immediately and he was tempted to walk the other direction. He was going to until the kid turned around and looked him dead in the eyes. 

Patrick quickly walked towards Mikey with a glint of determination and maybe even anger that Mikey had never seen before. Mikey stood by the wall he was lurking around and pretended to fiddle with one of the straps of his backpack. He hoped that if he looked busy, Patrick wouldn’t say anything to him. He was wrong. 

“We need to talk”, Patrick demanded. He was right in front of Mikey and was giving Mikey the worst case of stank eye. Mikey almost didn’t recognise the formerly docile and oblivious little freshmen that had been unknowingly taking away Pete from Mikey. “Now”, Patrick added, when Mikey didn’t say anything.

“I have to go to class”, was all Mikey thought to say. He stood where he was mostly but tried to walk to the side and slip away.

“No you don’t”, Patrick said, grabbing Mikey’s wrist sharply, planting him there. If it had been anyone else or any other time, Mikey would have jerked his wrist away and cursed at the grabber. But today he just stared at Patrick with wide eyes and an uneasy feeling he couldn’t place.

“I know you skip class a lot. What’s another class going to hurt?”, Patrick bitterly asked while dragging Mikey by the wrist towards the exit at the end of the hallway. 

“That’s kind of why I have to go to class”, Mikey mumbled, thinking about how he was probably failing math. Patrick chose to ignore his comment and Mikey just decided to go with Patrick. How bad could it get?

Patrick dropped Mikey’s wrist once they had made it outside. It was a terribly beautiful day. It was too good of a day for this. Mikey followed Patrick as he led them up to a forested area by the school. Mikey was pretty sure that this was where kids went to smoke and get high during school hours, but they didn’t see anybody getting stoned. Maybe because it was barely nine am. 

Patrick finally sat down on a fallen tree. It was a thick log and was covered in moss. It looked out of a movie. Instead of sitting down on the log next to Patrick like a normal person would, Mikey decided to keep up his cold and impassive attitude and leaned against a skinny tree in front of the log. He even folded his arms.

Patrick sighed and placed his head in his arms. He looked really tired. For the first time, Mikey saw Patrick as a normal highschool kid. Not the annoying, Pete obsessed, ginger freshmen that Mikey always thought when somebody mentioned the name “Patrick Stump”. He just saw Patrick as a kid, just like Mikey. 

“Look, I know you don’t like me”, Patrick started, keeping his head in his arms, “I guess I know why. I cling to Pete like my life depends on it. I know you two where really close before I moved here. I’m sorry if it bothers… bothered you. But I need your help. I need to know what happened.” Patrick sighed again and rubbed his temples. 

“ I… We both know that Pete will do dumb things when he’s upset. And I know he’s upset because of you. I’m not blaming you. I just know that something happened. He was acting weird the last few days and I didn’t know why. I don’t know why. God! I wish he was here right now. I’d punch him in his face. I hate him sometimes. I fuckin hate him, but he is like a brother to me. He’s a dumb, stupid, and idiodic brother, but I still love him. I… I don’t want to find Pete dead in a creek or something.”

Mikey stood there, leaning on his tree, but with slightly more sympathetic eyes. He felt a slight tug on his heart and he almost considered giving Patrick a hug. If something were to happen to Gerard, Mikey wouldn’t know what to do. Maybe Patrick wasn’t so bad after all. 

“I’m sorry”, Mikey found himself saying after they had been quite for a while. Patrick looked up from his arms at Mikey and Mikey could see that his eyes were a little puffy.

“It’s my fault”, Mikey started, gulping. He felt a wave of guilt swarm over his body. “Pete and I have been friends for a while. We used to spend most of time with each other”. Mikey slowly walked over to the fallen tree at sat down next to Patrick. 

“But something happened when he got back from Chicago this year. He used to go there, tell us all his stories, and then we’d move on with our lives here. But this year when he came back, he started blowing me off a lot. Then he started blowing off our other friends that he used to hangout with. I’d be lying to say it didn’t piss me off. He knew it pissed me off. We stopped talking to each other and we started avoiding each other and he started acting weird. It’s like there was some weird tension between us, I don’t know what it is, though. I should have known somthing was wrong, I’m stupid, God. I was too mad at him to try and help him”, Mikey shook his head.

“Hey, it’s okay, Mikey. Don’t beat yourself up, it won’t do anything”, Patrick cooed.

“He actually tried to talk to me one day, but I was with Alicia, and she wanted to do… something. I was also pissed at him so I just left with her. I shouldn’t have done that. The next day Gabe tried to get us to talk about it, but we were both too stubborn to talk. He called Alicia a slut and I got mad. I accused him off…”,Mikey trailed off, remembering what he said. He figured it wouldn’t do any good to tell Patrick that he had said that Pete and Patrick propably had sex, even if it was a joke, so instead he said, “I may have jokingly called him gay… And he lost it”.

Patrick gasped a little. He ran his fingers through his ginger hair and his eyes went wide. “Oh my God. Pete is such a dumb ass.” The way Patrick said it made Mikey think that he knew something.

“What?”, Mikey asked concerned.

“I can’t really tell you. But I think I know what Pete’s upset about. Pete left me this note, here look at it”, Patrick said while fumbling in the pocket of his jean pocket. He pulled out a pink tinted paper and handed it to Mikey.

Mikey unraveled the paper. Written in blue ink and in Pete’s handwriting was: “I screwed up, I wanted my Way but instead I took the highWay. I guess I don’t get my Redemption. Come find me- P.W.”

“I know why he’s upset now, I just don’t know where he is”, Patrick said over Mikey’s shoulder.

Mikey re-read the note over and over again feeling the corgs in his brain turn. It felt like sometimes he didn’t really think, he just did what he was told, whether it be by Bert or the school or his mother. But right now he was thinking. 

“Patrick give me your address. I’ll pick you up at eight?”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I prolly update more cause I'm trying to finnish this so I can focus on another project. Stay Safe :)


	18. Frank gets a girl

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is real short. My bad.

Mikey had read over the note multiple times when he got to class. Mikey had a pretty good idea at what Pete was trying to say in the note, but he wanted to look over it some more before picking Patrick up. Pete was always a sucker for symbolic and sentimental things and Mikey thinks that this note is another example. 

Mikey fumbled with the paper in his Chemistry class. He wasn’t paying too much attention to the lesson but he could probably get the notes from somebody later on. He read the note again for what felt like the fifth time. The Way part was extremely obvious. Pete was upset because of his and Mikey’s fall out. Mikey was just struggling to think of the Highway and Redemption parts.

During his English class, he took the note out again, just reading it. Alicia gave him some weird looks but she didn’t say anything. Mikey was thankful, he really didn’t want to have to explain to Alicia what was happening right now. Alicia was one of Mikey’s best friends, but he just couldn’t talk about it yet. He needed to find Pete first. 

It was only after school that Mikey realized what the Highway and Redemption part meant. Mikey had been hiding behind the school, waiting for the bus to come and smoking a cigarette, when Frank came over smiling. 

“Hey”, Frank beamed. Mikey wished he could have an ounce of Frank’s enthusiasm. “Guess what just happened?”, Frank asked.

“Hmm?”, Mikey replied, feeding into Frank’s excitement. Just because Mikey wasn’t feeling it today ment that he should bring Frank down too.

“Jamia just kissed me”, Frank practically squealed.

Mikey nearly choked on his cigarette smoke when he heard that. No, that was a lie, he did cough. He coughed so much that Frank actually punched him on the arm, rather hard at that. 

“Dude, is it really that unbelievable that I got kissed?”, Frank frowned. He was trying hard to seem like he didn’t care, but Mikey could sense even though his coughing fit that Frank was a little upset.

“No dude, it’s not that. I just wasn’t expecting Jamia to be the type to make the first move. Congrats dude”, Mikey tried hard to muster a smile and clasped frank on the shoulder, “you should ask her out now. On a real date”. 

Frank smiled at Mikey. Sometimes Mikey forgot that even though Frank was a little punk ass and could be tough as nails, he was also a giddy sixteen year old kid. Frank could get himself into a good fight and could cuss up a storm, but he could also get himself shoved in lockers and had been too shy to play spin the bottle at Pete’s party. Now that Mikey thinks about it, this was probably Frank’s first kiss.

“Was this your first kiss?”, Mikey asked with eyebrows raised. Frank blushed a little but then nodded. “Dude, that’s cool. Congrats man, I’m happy for you”, Mikey said. He wasn’t lying. He was upset about the Pete situation but he was still genuinely happy that Frank was making progress with Jamia.

“Thanks”, Frank replied, grinning a little to himself. “Oh by the way”, he added, “We never got to finnish that movie… what was it….? Oh whatever. You wanna finnish it? I still have the rental on it for today before I have to give it back”, Frank asked.

Mikey bit his lip a little. He really did want to just hangout with Frank, maybe smoke some weed, and pretend that everything was okay. But Mikey knew that he had to find Pete. Plus, he already made plans with Patrick. 

“You mean ShawShank Redemption?”, MIkey scoffed. How could somebody forget a name like that? “I’m sorry man, but I have some… obligations”, Mikey trailed. He didn’t really want to explain how he ended up offering to take Patrick, who Mikey hated up until six hours ago, go on a wild goose chase for Pete. 

Frank furrowed his eyebrows a bit. “Are you just trying to blow me off? You can say you just don’t wanna-”

“No it’s not that. I have obligations… seriously, dude! I can’t say now, but I’ll tell you about it later”, Mikey explained, taking the last drags of his cigarettes.

“Okay”, Frank said. “Also yeah… I think it was ShawShank Redemption. It’s a weird name”, Frank shrugged.

“I guess it is. Pete used to call the back roads that went north ShawShank roa-”, Mikey stopped. He knew. He knew where Pete was. Mikey hastily put out his cigarette. “I gotta go Frank”, he said before taking off, leaving a confused Frank behind. Mikey would explain later but right now Mikey was determined to find Pete. He was going to need a flashlight and Gerard’s car.


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mikey being batshit crazy and emotional.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all !!! I hope y'all are all okay and doing well. I have some warning for this chapter, there is some violcene and underage drinking. If you are touchy with that, plz take caution. I wrote this while listening to rap, so it's a little raunchy. Also the shitty neighborhood part is based on my personal feeling towards my neighborhood. Like I wouldn't want to raise my kids here, but at the same time I have a certin fondness for my neighborhood. It's weird but I hope y'all get it. Enjoy :)

If life was a romantic comedy, Pete would be the blonde chick in every single movie. Sure, Pete had dreads instead of a blonde balayage and side chicks instead of a handsome boyfriend, but he could be a real Cher if he wanted too. He was sentimental, sensitive, and good at grabbing attention. But most of all, he was predictable. So very predictable.

Mikey had smiled when he saw that Gerard was home for the weekend. His grin only widened when he saw that Bert was over and that his mom was out for the weekend. That ment he got to drive the Subaru and his mom wouldn’t have to know about his escapades. Normally he’d be pissed about Gerard hanging out with Bert. Mikey was pretty sure that Bert and Gerard were sleeping together and that they were doing drugs in the basement. Today Mikey was thankful that Bert was here because when he asked Gerard for the keys he handed them over without whining. 

When seven thirty rolled around, Mikey gathered up his supplies. He got a big handheld flashlight from Gerard’s room (why did Gerard need a flashlight that big?), the car keys from Gerard, and a pack of cigarettes from his own room. He hopped into the car and looked down at the slip of paper that Patrick wrote down his address on. Mikey recognized the road as one of the ones that belonged to a nicer neighborhood. It was almost as nice as Pete’s neighborhood, almost. 

After only about ten minutes of driving Mikey already saw the difference in neighborhoods. The streets didn’t have cracks in them and the street lamps all worked. The houses all had spacious backyards and were single units. Mikey thinks he’d never want to live in one of these neighborhoods. They seem so dull and boring. Mikey may have complained about all the kids running around, gang violence, and worrying about being jumped, but there was something strangely comforting about it.

There was a community and people looked out for each other. The tough Italian kids had an odd fondness for Mikey, they thought he was this weird gangly metal head kid but they still liked him for some reason. They used to play kickball and smoke cigarettes when they were younger and sometimes they still hang out when Pete wasn’t around. They didn’t like Pete, they thought he was a brat. There is just something about knowing that you’ve been handed the short stick in life. It makes you want to stick together. So even though Mikey might have gotten his ass kicked a few times because he was shit at fighting and he saw more police cars that Cadillacs, he wouldn’t trade his upbringing for another. It made him a little rough around the edges.

Mikey pulled up to the address that Patrick had given him and he honked the car door. No way he was going to knock on Patrick’s door. Mikey remembers when he knocked on Pete’s door back when they were freshmens and Pete’s dad answered. Gerard was going to take them to the theater and told Mikey to go and get Pete. Pete’s dad looked at Mikey’s beat up converse and Anthrax shirt with a look of distaste before looking at Gerard’s beat up black Subaro and told Mikey that Pete was sick. Mikey swore to God that he’d never knock on one of these doors again. Luckily, Patrick came stumbling out soon after the first honk.

Patrick opened the back door of the Suboro slowly like if he opened it too fast he’d scare Mikey. “Hey”, was all Patrick said. He looked shy as he crawled into the car. Mikey laughed a little. What had happened to Patrick’s aggressive nature that he bore earlier?

“You can ride shotgun, you know”, Mikey said, guestering to the empty front seat.’

Patrick nodded. “Oh… uh… thanks”, he mumbled while getting in the front seat. It took all Mikey had not to laugh at Patrick. He didn’t think of himself as a scary guy. Patrick really needed to loosen up. 

Mikey fumbled around with the radio for a second before speeding off. He heard Patrick gasp a little as the car accelerated. Mikey liked driving fast. Sometimes he forgot that not everyone had the same taste for speed. He slowed down a little and turned down the volume of the radio.

“So… I think I know where Pete is”, Mikey started figuring he should let Patrick in on his thoughts. “There are these roads that the school buses used to drive on, they led up north or what ever. Back when ShawShank Redemtion came out, Pete was absolutly fucking obsessed with it. He would not shut the fuck up about it. He used to call those roads ShawShank roads because if you drove far enough on them, you’d go up to Maine. I think he’s there”, Mikey finished.

“In Maine?”, Patrick asked, giving Mikey an ‘Are you shitting me?’ look.

“No, not in Maine. I think he’s like… hanging out in the woods by the roads. He said something about Redemption which made me think of ShawShank. If he’s not there than I have no clue where the fuck he is.” The car went quiet. Mikey couldn’t see what Patrick looked like, but he thinks that Patrick was mulling over what Mikey said. It sounded stupid. Mikey knows that. It sounds really stupid that he thinks that Pete is literaly hanging out in the fucking woods like a caveman just because Pete made a refrence to ShawShank Redemtion. It sounded real fucking stupid. It would have been completly stupid if it wasn’t for the fact that Pete was stupid like that. If it were anybody else, forget it. But it was Pete and this was the exact dumb shit Pete would do. 

When they finally reached the roads, Mikey swerved over to the side and parked the car. Patrick gave him the most worried glance that Mikey ever received. He would have laughed if it were any other scenario, but he didn’t want to laugh right now. Mikey grabbed the flashlight and nodded his head towards the door before getting out.

The sun had already gone down as it was about eight and late November. Mikey clicked the flashlight open and pointed it at Patrick who jumped. 

“God, don’t blind me”, Patrick whined from the opposite side of the car.

“Wouldn’t dream of it”, Mikey replied while wielding the flashlight crazily. He hears Patrick walk closer and the crunch of fall leaves. Mikey really hoped Pete was here. If he wasn’t, they’d be screwed. Mega screwed. Mikey bit his lip nervously. He fumbled around his coat pocket for his pack of cigarettes, he was gonna need them. He put one in his lip and cupped his hand, trying to block the wind to lit up.

Patrick jumped a little when he heard the click of Mikey’s lighter. Mikey actually laughed at that which made his throat burn with the smoke. He coughed a little.

“Shit, that scared me”, Patrick huffed.

Mikey laughed some more but not in malice… more so with affection. The kind of laugh one would reserve for a younger sibling when they did something foolish. Not that Mikey would know what having a younger sibling would be like.

“Dude, it was just my lighter”, Mikey smiled. He dug around his pocket again for his cigarettes. “Want one?”, he asked, waving the pack around. Maybe the kid could use a smoke, he was certainly jumpy.

Patrick shook his head. “No thanks, I don’t smoke”. They walked a few feet into the woods. “Never have”, he added as the crunch of fall leaves increased.

“Really? Never?”, Mikey squeaked. He found it hard that anyone who was in highschool had never smoked. Mikey was twelve when the kids on his block had offered him his first cigarette and Gerard was ten when he tried. Everybody smoked once in their life. 

“Never”, Patrick responded.

“You wanna try?”, Mikey asked. There was always a time for a first. 

Patrick shook his head and gave a smiling smile. “Nah. Pete would kill me. He’s like my protector or whatever. Plus, I’m in chorus so I don’t want to wreck my voice”, he explained. Mikey nodded his head. He got it. He wasn’t going to pressure Patrick into smoking or anything, although he thought it would be a bit hypocritical for Pete to scold Patrick if he were to smoke. Pete had smoked. He quit smoking when he made the soccer team in sophomore year. He was never a big cigarette smoker, more of a pothead, but he still swore never to smoke while in highschool. He only ever did edibles now. 

“Pete used to smoke”, Mikey recalled once they had made it deeper into the woods. Mikey didn’t really know how they were going to find Pete in the huge woods, but he figures if they walk enough they’ll find him. Mikey stared down at his head and felt a ball of sadness grow at the bottom of his stomach, remembering all the fun he had had with Pete. even if they found Pete, there was no guarantee that Pete and him would make up. 

Mikey’s thoughts were interrupted when Patrick squeaked, “Really?”.

“Yeah”, Mikey laughed. “Come to think of it, I think I got him into it. Shit, I guess I’m kind of a bad influence on him. Whatever, he got me into the pot so I guess we're even”, he chuckled. “We were like… thirteen and I offered him one. Actually he was fourteen, I was the thirteen year old. He was fourteen. That’s crazy. Pete at fourteen was different.”

“Yeah. I noticed he acted differently when he came back to visit when he was fifteen. He seemed more… angsty? I don't know…”, Patrick trailed like he didn’t know what he was exactly getting at. Mikey did, though. He nodded, remembering when Pete became more aggressive and raunchy. It was always Gabe that was the crazy one. Gabe was always (and still) doing incredibly stupid things. But then all of a sudden Pete started doing even stupider things. They made Mikey look smart. 

“I catch you drift. Pete’s just…”

“Pete”, Patrick finished for him. There was an air of solemnity that stuck around in the air. It was like a cloud of thick melancholy surrounded the boys. Mikey really hoped they would find Pete.

They walked in silence for a while. The only sound was the crunching of leaves and the occasional flick of Mikey’s lighter. Mikey was going through the pack of cigarettes like it was candy. Whatever, he needed it. Who cared if he was going to fuck up his voice or lungs? He was already halfway through his pack when he said, “I used to hate you, you know?”.

Patrick stopped in his tracks. “Really?”, he asked, furrowing his eyebrows. “I knew you didn’t like me… Why?”.

Mikey sighed. He didn’t want to explain why he didn’t like Patrick. He didn’t even know why he blurted that out. His emotions were riding high since Pete left. If he didn’t find Pete, he didn’t know why he was going to do it. 

“This is going to sound stupid”, Mikey prefaced. He took a long drag of his cigarette. Thank God for cigarettes. He now understood why Gerard smoked cigarettes like his life depended on it. “But I was jealous of you and Pete. It was stupid and I’m sorry about it. I guess it doesn’t really matter anymore because now we are both stuck looking for Pete’s sorry ass in the middle of a fucking forrest”.

It was Patrick’s turn to sigh. “Don’t sweat it Mikey. I get it. I’d be pissed if it were the other way around. In a way, I kind of hated you too. Pete would never shut up about you. He was always talking about you in Chicago and when I moved here he’d always be whining about you. ‘ _Why can’t I talk to Mikey? Why am I so weird? Help me Trick, Help me_ ” Patrick mimicked. 

Mikey laughed at Patrick’s imitation of Pete and soon Patrick joined too. The laugh hurt. It was freak how well Patrick could imitate Pete but it stung Mikey to think that Pete had felt like that. They hadn’t even really been fighting about anything. Mikey didn’t know what was going on. He really didn’t. He didn’t. He didn’t. He didn’t.

“I’m sorry. You’re a cool kid”, Mikey apologized. His stomach was still screaming. He really just wanted to find Pete. 

“Thanks. I’m sorry too. You seem cool, scary, but cool”, Patirck said.

“You think I’m scary?”, Mikey asked, chuckling.

“Kind of. Pete talked about you like you were some badass metalhead punk kid that came from a shitty neighborhood and smoked pot. Nobody back at home really did that so yeah, it kind of scared me”, Patrick offered with a half smile. 

Mikey rolled his eyes. Of course Pete would do something like that. “I’m not scary, don’t listen to Pete. I listen to copious amounts of The Smith and am the biggest geek for comics. I play DnD with college kids and am kind of a Mama’s boy”, Mikey explained. “Don’t tell anybody about that last part though”, he added with a thoughtful smile.

Patrick laughed. “I won’t.”

***

It turns out Patrick was a pretty okay kid. He liked a lot classic punk which Mikey could totally be down with. They talked about Joey Ramone’s hair and if the Clash were a bunch of posers. Mikey stopped smoking his smokes and he felt his stomach slowly unknot. It never went fully back to normal, but it did loosen a bit. They had been in the forest for a while when Patrick stopped abruptly.

“Look”, he said, pointing out into the distance. Mikey turned the flashlight to where Patrick was pointing. The outline of a bluish tint could be seen in the horizon. Before Mikey could even process it, Patrick started in a dead sprint towards the tent. Mikey just stood there, watching as Patrick approached the tent. He hoped it wasn’t a random homeless man living there. That’d be awkward.

Mikey saw Patrick shake the tent and a figure similar to Patrik’s height make their way out of the tent. Mikey really hoped it wasn’t a homeless man. The figure stood up and they both remained still until Patrick flung himself on the other figure. That’s when Mikey knew that it was Pete. They had found Pete.

Everything felt surreal as Mikey watched Patrick and Pete walk towards him. Patrick had his arm around Pete and was grinning. They walked closer as Mikey just stood there, utterly still. He didn’t know how he felt. He was glad that they had found Pete. He was so happy. Happier than words could describe. At the same time he was angry. He didn’t know what to feel. All he knew was that he felt adrenaline slowly rise with every step closer Pete and Patrick took. Eventually they were close, only six feet away. 

“Hey Mikey”, Pete nervously greeted. He was biting his lip and had his shoulder raised. His dreads had collected some dried leaves and his clothes had stains on them. He looked like shit. Before Mikey could even register what Pete said or his condition, Mikey felt his fist colid with Pete’s eye.

“You’re so stupid!”, Mikey yelled. He had fallen on top of Pete after punching him and was currently focused on throwing more. Pete looked shocked as he tried to push Mikey off in vain. He even threw a punch back at Mikey. Mikey didn’t feel it as his adrenaline rushed through his veins.

“So fucking stupid! Don’t scare me like that”, Mikey screamed as he punched Pete’s jaw. Pete squealed and kicked Mikey’s legs. It didn’t hut. Pete used the kicke to straddle Mikey and flip him over. Mikey was always shit at fighting. He knew his glasses broke when Pete slammed his fist into Mikey’s right eye. He didn’t care though. He yelped a little before kicking Pete hard in the stomach to get him off . Pete flew back a few feet and off Mikey. 

They both stood up, panting heavily. They stared at each other with burning dancing eyes. They were like wild animals waiting to launch and attack. Wild and reckless. Mikey knew that once he calmed down, he’d start feeling the pain that Pete had inflicted. But right now adrenaline was blocking any pain and logical thinking. 

Mikey felt himself quiver before throwing himself on Pete. Instead of punching him, he just hugged him. He hugged him so hard. He felt Pete wrap his arms around his torso and squeeze him back. It wasn’t manly but it was needed. Mikey didn’t realize that he needed Pete until now.

“I’m sorry, Mikey”, Pete whispered.

“I am too. I’m sorry Pete”, Mikey shivered. He felt a sudden sting under his eye and realized that he was crying. He hadn’t cried since his dad left all those years ago. Shit. 

When they pulled apart, Mikey saw that Pete had shed a few tears too. He also saw the damage he inflicted on Pete. Pete was sporting a bloody nose and swollen eye that would soon to be turnt black.He laughed a little. “I guess I deserved those punches. Sorry about that, by the way”, Pete apoligzed, pulling Mikey’s glasses off his face.

“Don’t do that to me again Pete. I swear”, Mikey choked. He felt his throat tighten like he was about to cry some more. He swallowed quickly. No more crying for tonight. 

“I won’t. I promise Mikeyway”, Peter responded with his eyes wide and vulnerable. 

“Are you ready to go home?”, Mikey asked. He didn’t notice, but he was standing dangerously close to Pete. Like they were about to kiss. Mikey quickly shook the thought out of his head.

“Yeah”, Pete whispered. He pulled Mikey in for another embrace and they stayed like that for a while, sniffling and trying to hide their tears. They eventually pulled apart when Patrick cleared his throat. Mikey totally forgot that Patrick was here. Mikey started laughing hysterically. If Patrick thought he was scary before, he probably thought Mikey was insane after seeing him punch and tackle Pete. Pete started laughing too. Maybe this would all be okay.


	20. I Should Be Over All the Butterflys

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> But I'm into you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry. I was really busy and sad this week. I had lot's of school work, projects, essays, yada yada. Thank you for everyone who had been loyally reading this! It makes me want to write this, not only for myself but for y'all too! Anyways, here is a really shitty chapter!

The walk back to the car was silent. Mikey didn’t think he could speak even if he wanted too. He was over the moon that they found Pete. He was probably smiling like a goon. He didn’t even care that he was limping. As they continued walking, Mikey noticed that his upper cheek hurt. He carefully touched it and pulled back when he felt a warm liquid on his fingertips. When Pete punched his glasses it must have shattered the glass and cut Mikey. He’d pick the shards out later.

When they made it to the car, Patrick took the back seat and Pete took shotgun. Mikey started the car engine and almost put the car into drive when he noticed a glint in the back seat. He turned around and grinned. Gerard had left a vodka bottle in the backseat. Mikey grabbed it, hopping it had some left (knowing Gerard it very well might have been empty). To Mikey’s delight, it was a little less than half full.

Mikey popped up the cork and took a deep swig. He fucking needed it after what he had been throught. He saw Patrick in the rearview mirror give him a shocked and concerned look as he drank the burning liquid. When he pulled the bottle away from his lips, he grinned, already feeling a little loser.

“Don’t worry Patrick, I’m a good driver”, he smiled. Normally he’d pass the bottle over to Pete who was already giving him longing eyes, but in the spur of the moment, Mikey decided that Patrick, the innocent and wholesome freshmen needed a drink.

“Try it”, Mikey said as he handed the bottle back. Patrick raised his eyebrows and shied away but took the bottle. He eyes at it suspiciously before looking at Pete.

“Go on, Trick. Make some high school memories”, Pete laughed. Tonight definitely was going to be a highschool memory. Patrick slowly raised the bottle to his lips and winced at the harshness of the vodka.

“It tastes terrible”, he grimaced.

Pete smiled while taking the bottle. “It does”, Pete agreed before taking a generous sip himself. He winced. “Fuck Mikey, you busted my lip”, he cursed. Pete tried handing the bottle back to Patrick but he shook his head.

“You trip me up, Patrick”, Pete laughed. “One day I’ll get you drunk”.

Patrick shrugged as Mikey put the car into drive. “I swear Pete… you are a bad influence”, Mikey said, the car jerking forward obnoxiously. It was then that Mikey realized that he was not only under the influence, he was also partially blind without his glass. 

“Uh… Pete”, he started nervously, putting the car back into park. “You’re gonna have to drive”.

Pete quirked his eye brows before coming to the same relaxation. “Oh, yeah. I’ll drive if you let me stay the night?”, Pete asked.

“Pete!”, Patrick yelled from the backseat. “Just drive! God! Do you want to die in a car crash!”. 

Pete remained quiet for a few seconds, as if he was wondering if he would in fact like to die in a car crash. “Um… it’s not exactly how I imagined going but-”

“Pete!”.

“Okay yeah… I’ll drive”, Pete huffed while opening up the back door and getting out. Mikey hopped out the front door and they both traded seats.

“You can still stay the night if you need some place to go”, Mikey said once he had gotten situated in the passenger seat. 

Pete smiled. “Really?”, he asked, the smile still growing.

“Of course”, Mikey smiled. “Anything for you, Petey”.

***

After they had dropped Patrick off, Pete pulled up in front of the Way household. Apparently Pete wasn’t ready to face his mother’s wrath just yet. He figured he’d be more equipped to deal with her in the morning once he had gotten some sleep. When Pete parked the car, Mikey hopped out the passenger seat immediately. He noticed some of the neighborhood kids hanging out across the street under the lamp posts. 

“You get in a fight, Mikeyway?”, one of the kids hanging out asked. His name was Leo and he used too much hair gel and smoked too many cigarettes.

“Yeah”, Mikey sighed while slamming the car door shut. 

“How's the other guy look?”, Davie quipped while swinging his legs around the fence.

“I am the other guy”, Pete said, walking out from behind the car. Pete usually tried to avoid the kids in Mikey’s neighborhood. Mikey thinks that they threatened to jump Pete once when they were younger. 

Leo and Davie gave each other a look with raised eyebrows. “Damn”, Davie said. They eyed Pete up and down, giving him disapproving looks. 

“What are you doing hanging out with trust fund babies?”, Leo called out. 

Mikey shrugged. “Don’t know. Hanging out. I’ll see you all later”, Mikey said, waving his hand up. He really didn’t need to hear shit from any of the neighborhood kids right now. Mikeu flung his arm sloppily around Pete and they made it up to the doorway. Mikey jammed his key into the lock and opened the door a little more aggressively than he planned to. 

“Mikey”, he heard his mother squak from the kitchen, Shoot, he had thought she was working late tonight, Or maybe she was and he was just getting home really late. Shoot.

“Yeah, it’s me, Ma”, Mikey called out. “Do you mind if Pete stays over tonight?”, he asked, even though he knew what the answer would be.

“Sure, honey. Where were you?”.

“Picking Pete up from his friends house”, Mikey lied. “Good night”, he called while running up the stairs, dragging Pete in hand. They may or may not have been giggling all the way up. Mikey pulled Pete into the bathroom and closed the door quickly.

“Let’s clean ourselves up”, he said as he pushed Pete onto the toilet seat. Mikey began to shuffle through the medical cabinet, looking for rubbing alcohol, cotton swabs, and things of that sorts. Pete hopped off the toilet and started rinsing his face with the sink water, washing the blood off his face. 

“Good, you’re scrappy for a skinny fucker”, Pete cursed as he looked at his bruised lip and black eye.

“Yeah? Well you're not too bad for a short fucker”, Mikey retorted, dumping some alcohol onto a cotton ball and pressing it against Pete’s cuts. Pete winced and recoiled back. “God, you’re a baby”, Mikey scoffed, dumping more alcohol on another cotton ball and dabbing it on his own wounds. He was going to have to pick the shards of glass of his upper cheek and eye area before putting any alcohol on it. God, that was going to hurt.

“How are you not in pain?, Pete gawked from next to Mikey.

“I don’t know. I guess I got hurt a lot as a kid. People liked to fuck around with the nerdy kid with glasses”, Mikey shrugged. It was true, kids in middle school used to rough him up a bit. He was a shitty fighter already and when you considered the fact that it was usually two against one… well you can do the math.

“That’s fucked up”, Pete sadly said. His eyes were wide and glossy like he felt bad,

“Eh, it is what it is”, Mikey shrugged again. He picked up a tweezer and began plucking out glass pieces.

“Sorry about that by the way”, Pete grimace. “Here, let me do it”, Pete said while grabbing the tweezers from Mickey's hand. He pushed Mikey on the toilet and clasped his jaw. They made eye contact for a while, Mikey gazing into Pete’s eyes. Pete was the first one to break it, bending down and starting to pick the glass out of Mikey’ check.

Mikey didn’t even wince as the glass was plucked out. He just mumbled under his breath occasionally and Pete would laugh. 

“My mom’s gonna kill me. Glasses are fucking expensive”, Mikey laughed a little as he felt an awfuly big peice of glass removed from around his eye. 

“I’m really sorry about that”, Pete apologized for the millionth time that night.

“Nah, it’s okay. I shouldn’t have punched you in the first place”, Mikey admitted, waving his arm in the air. He sure hoped Pete would hurry up, he was tired.

“Alright well… if we’re on the topic of being killed… please don’t kill me for what I’m about to do '', Pete nervously said, looking wide eyes and dory.

“For wh-”, Mikey began but was cut off by Pete’s lips. It surprised Mikey, who gasped a little but ultimately decided to kiss back. It felt odd, it was weird. Pete’s lip was definitely beat up, it was swollen and large but it felt soft and a bit sweet. Kissing Pete was different from kissing a girl, Pete was more aggressive it was weird… but Mikey liked it. 

Pete was the first one to pull back, leaving Mikey staring at him blankly.“I was thinking, remember when we first watched that one movie, ‘ShawShank Redemption’ when we were freshmans”, Pete started nervously. Mikey nodded.

“Remember, back then you didn’t smoke weed because you were scared Gerard was going to yell at you or snitch so you’d only smoke it when it was just the two of us alone? I got you so high that night because you had absolute shit tolerance and you freaked out when I got all deep on you? That one quote, ‘Gut busy living or get busy dying?’. Do you remember what I said about living? How I felt like wasting life was just as bad as dying? I hope you remember, Mikeyway. Because I still think like that three years later. I feel like this feud, whatever it is between us, I feel like I’m dying. I don’t want to do it. I want to live. I wanted to stop dying and get busy living”. 

“Damn, Pete”, Mikey said while touching his mouth like it was blessed by a priest or something.They had kissed so many times before, but this one felt real. The other times were just jokes to freak old people out. This one was real.

Pete took a step back nervously. His eyes got large and his nostrils flared. He looked scared. “Shit, I didn’t like messing everything up with us? Did I? Oh shit! I fucking screwed us up!”, Pete said, getting worked up. Pete always got worked up easily.

“No, no. We’re not fucked up”, Mikey reassured quickly. He thinks he liked the kiss. But shit! Alicia! “I mean… I liked it”, Mikey continued.

“But?”, Pete asked, knowing a but was there.

“But like… I... Alicia…. And I don’t know if I’m even gay.”

Pete sheepishly smiled a little. He put his arm around his neck. “Mikey, I don’t even know if I’m gay. But like, I like you and I think you like me. So can we maybe just try it, you know? And if it doesn’t work out… can’t you like put your progress with Alicia on hold?”. Pete seemed really nervous, like he just asked if Mikey minded cutting his arm off for him.

“What?”, Mikey laughed. “Pete! You can’t just put girls on pause! They’re not like… video games!”, he couldn’t stop laughing. He kind of felt butterflies. He never knew what people meant when they said they felt butterflies. But now he knows. “But, I’ll definitely put Alicia on pause, just for you”.

Pete laughed a little too. “I’m honored”. He took steps closer to Mikey and kissed him. Mikey definitely felt the butterflies.


	21. Peace Offerings

The next day at school flew by quickly as Mikey day dreamt about Pete’s lips that were on his just the previous night. Mikey was normally calm and stoic, but all throughout his morning classes he found himself tapping the floor with his foot or swinging his legs back and forth. He kept on smiling to himself and he felt giddy, just like he felt with Alicia two years ago. The thought of Alicia made him wince, he was not ready to talk to her. Lunch found it’s way quicker than Mikey had hoped, whether it was his dread to talk to Alicia or excitement to talk to Pete, he didn’t know.

Mikey walked quickly to the cafeteria and zig-zagged through kids and their lunch trays as he made his way to their normal table. Frank, Patrick, Pete, and Alicia were already there. Today the whole group was talking to each other, Pete and Patrick weren’t secluded. Mikey walked behind Alicia and tapped her on the shoulder. She turned away from her sandwich.

“What’s up, Mikey?”. She put her sandwich down and looked at Mikey. He must have looked a little nervous, because she immediately asked, “Do you wanna go to the bleachers?”. Mikey gulped and nodded.

Alicia stood up out of her seat. She looked a little nervous herself. She grabbed her bag and slid out of the table apprehensively. Frank looked at Mikey and furrowed his eyebrows when Alicia got up. He was obviously confused. Mikey just shook his head, he was confused too. Frank shrugged. Mikey would tell Frank later.

The two walked out to the bleachers in silence. Mikey felt his palms grow sweaty the closer he got to the bleachers. He dreaded how awkward the conversation was gonna be, all like, ‘Hey, I know we are kind of a thing but not really but we aren’t anymore. I’m kind of breaking up with you even though we’re not together’. It even sounded bad in Mikey’s head. 

Once they reached the top of the bleachers, Mikey and Alicia plopped down. There were a bunch of football players hanging around. Mikey figures that they were probably practicing or something. Other than the football players, there was a surprising lack of people under the bleachers, just some stoners on the other end of the bleachers smoking a joint. This was probably the best time to tell Alicia right now.

“So um… you know how we have this thing?”, Mikey asked the second they got down under the bleachers and were sitting down. Alicia chuckled a little, her long eyelashes batting. Mikey couldn’t tell if it was a nervous chuckle or a knowing chuckle. It made him more nervous.

“Yeah, Mikey. We have a _thing_ ”, Alicia replied with a friendly eyeroll. 

Mikey nodded and gulped. He really wanted a cigarette- or a joint. But he had smoked all his cigarettes and all the pot he was carrying was for Bert’s customers. He really hoped Alicia wouldn’t take it the wrong way.

“Well… like… I think we might have to end it”, Mikey stuttered while looking down at the dirt. He fiddled around with the dusty dirt, drawing odd shapes and not looking at Alicia.

“What?”, Alicia huffed. She only sounded a little mad. That was good, right? Mikey didn’t bother to look at her when she said that. He continued to draw circles in the dirt. “Mikey, are you seriously gonna break up our relationship? Over what?”.

Mikey took a deep breath. He could trust Alicia not to tell anybody. Alicia had been a really close friend of Mikey’s for a long time. It felt like forever that they were hanging out. Mikey remembers the way his mother used to call up his father and tell him about her fears that Mikey was gay because of the amount of time he spent with Alicia. In junior high they did everything together. He remembers the relieved laugh his mother laughed when he told her that he was dating Alicia back in freshman year. Alicia was a huge part of his life. She could be trusted.

“I’m with somebody else”, Mikey sheepishly admitted. He did look up for that one. Alicia’s nose was flared and her eyes were fired up. She looked angry. She abruptly stood up, shaking her head and rolling her eyes.

“You cheated on me?”, she bellowed. Mikey stood up too and watched her pace back and forth. She was fuming.

“We weren’t even dating”, Mikey tried to reason. “We were never oficial”. It was true. They never said that they were dating or together. Although everyone kind of assumed that they were together and they never denied it. Shoot. Did Mikey cheat on her?

Alicia ignored Mikey’s interjection. Instead, she stopped pacing back and forth and looked Mikey dead in his eyes with a look of desperation that Mikey didn’t know was possible for a tough bad girl like Alicia to harbor.

“Just tell me who”, she demanded. Most of her anger had faded and her voice was laced with sadness. It was a glimpse into her weakness before she shook the sadness out her voice and replaced it with anger. “Just tell me who!”, she screeched, angry again.

Mikey actually backed up at that. He felt his head collide with one of the steps of the bleachers. It hurt a little, but it wasn’t his main concern as Alica advanced towards him. She grabbed the color of his jacket and looked at him with such craze. “Tell me who”, she demanded once more.

Mikey didn’t consider himself tough or anything. He wasn’t a bad boy or anything like that, but he wasn’t exactly a good kid either. He liked to think he was at least a little tough, though. He thought he had some authority. But boy did looking at Alicia mad like that scare him. He started to feel the guilt. He didn’t want to hurt Alicia like that.

“Pete Wentz”, Mikey mumbled. 

“Pete Wentz!?”, Alicia screamed. “Are you fucking with me, Mikey? I swear to God, tell me you are joking. You are _not_ leaving me for Pete Wentz! Are you?”.

Mikey didn’t have it in him to speak. He just nodded his head. Alicia seemed to finally realize that Mikey was being serious. He was leaving her for Pete Wentz. Alicia released his jacked and stormed off, cursing up a storm. Mikey could still hear her as she went out of the bleacher, but he didn’t say anything as Alicia called him every name unprintable under the sun. That was until she squealed;

“Leaving me for a fucking Faggot”.

Mikey perked up from where he was leaning against the bleachers. “What the fuck did you just say?”, he yelled. All of his previous sadness was magically transformed into anger. 

Alicia turned back to face him. “I said you left me for a Faggot, Mikey Way. You know what, Mikey? You are a Faggot. A fucking Faggot”, Alica cried through chocked sobs. She was crying but Mikey didn’t care. He was angry now.

“Fuck you Alicia! You’re such a little bitch! We weren’t together so don’t get mad at me for finding someone. Weren’t you the one who broke up with me so you could fuck the football team? Fuck you Alicia! And don’t use that Goddamn word!”.

Alica flipped him off before running back into the school building. Mikey only felt a little bad as she stumbled around. She just called him a faggot. Mikey did not expect things to go that way yet he felt some sorts of relieved as he sat back down and leaned against the bleachers. He could be with Pete now but he didn’t know that being with Pete meant losing Alicia as a friend. He sat perched up against the side of the bleachers for a few minutes, debating if he should just find everyone he needed to deal to and then cut the rest of his classes, go home and mop around. Mikey’s thoughts were interrupted by the deep voice of Bob Bryar.

“Hey, Way”, Bob fucking Bryar said. “Trouble in paradise?”, he asked, tilting his head to the direction where Alicia was.

“Fuck off, Bryar”, Mikey huffed back. He didn’t want to talk to Bob Bryar right now.

“God damn, Way. I didn’t do anything to deserve that.”

“You’ve been a dick to me since I fucking met you”, Mikey pointed out. Bob shrugged and sighed.

“Fine, I guess I was a dick. Here”, he took a small bag out of his back pocket and threw it at Mikey. “Consider it a peace offering”, Bob said before stalking off. Mikey caught the back and looked in it to see two pills in it.


	22. Sparks Fly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Drop everthing now, meet me in the poring rain. Kiss me on the side walk, Take away the pain"
> 
> lmao jk, Mikey feels sad. Pete comes over and makes him feel better. Real short (p.s. that's a T Swift song. I listen to MCR and T Swift. I'm all kinds of white girl, y'all)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I kid I really thought I'd be sitting in my room with a bomb ass face book account and a fucking hot pink bedazzled flip phone. I'd be popular and have a boyfriend, but no. All I do is sit on my ass, write shitty stories, and eat oreos at 3 am in the middle of a fucking pandemic. What the fuck? Where is my Joe Jonas to my Demi Lavoto? I'll even take Troy Bolton's crusty ass if I can get Gabriella's bomb ass voice. I may or may not be stuck in 2009??? I kind just want to go to the Asian mart... all my kimchi as over fermented and I want to make soup out of it but I can't go any where beccause of (in Cardi b's voice) *cAr0nA vIruZ*. Rip. Hope y'all like this

Mikey scrambled home right after Alicia and him sort of but not really broke up. The walk back from the school and his house was only about thirty minutes, completely manageable. Plus, he needed to walk. He needed to sort out his emotions before talking to anyone again.

He didn’t know how to deal with this. He felt grief over losing Alicia but at the same time he was angry at her. How dare she call Pete and Mikey that. It was the slur that really got him. She could get mad at him all she wanted, but how dare she call him a word like that. That’s where he drew the line.

Mikey didn’t even feel bad about missing his last four classes. He had been doing good. He sold in between classes and got to most classes relatively ontime and hardly skipped anymore. He’d been to every single day of school since the Pete and Patrick incident. He would catch up. 

Mikey flopped onto his bed when he first got home. He wanted to a) take a nap b) smoke weed or c) call Gerard. He didn’t have any weed since he wasn’t a regular smoker, not like Frank or anything, and Gerard was probably in class. Instead he flopped back onto his bead and stared at the ceiling. He still felt a sting around his right eye, the eye that Pete punched in his glasses. Luckily he had a spare pair. They were fucking ugly, but they’d have to do. Mikey slowly felt himself drift off into a sad,mistakeful sleep.

*** 

Mikey was woken up by the booming sound of a knock on his door. He sat up abruptly and looked around. The natural sunlight that had been shining in had disappeared and was replaced with the darkness of the evening. 

“Mikey, it’s me”, a muffled voice that Mikey recognised as Pete’s called out from behind the door. Mikey quirked his head in confusion. What was Pete doing here?

“Come in!”, Mikey called. He saw the slow opening of his door and Pete emerge from the shadows of the doorway. He was wearing a thin nervous smile and had a K-Mart bag slung across his arm.

“Hey,” Pete smiled. 

Mikey groggily rubbed his eyes and put his glasses on. “Hey Pete, what are you doing here?”, he croaked. Pete just smiled widder and sat on Mikey’s bad next to him. He unslung the K-Mart bag and flipped it upside down, dumping out all it’s contents. A slew of candy bars, a pack of cigarettes, and two mini bags of Doritos flew out.

“I heard you had a bad day”, he explained. “Word got around that Alicia and you had a fight of some sorts? I don’t really know. You don’t have to talk about it now, I just came around to deliver some goodies and cheer you up.”

Mikey felt his heart swell three times bigger like he was a freaky ole green monster. Pete was so sweet. “Wow. Thanks. You are amazing”, he smiled, picking a candy bar from the mix and digging in. Pete took a bag of chips and they began digging in, talking about trivial things and Frank’s new (ugly) haircut.

“You really think Jamia’s gonna fuck him with that hair cut?”, Pete asked.

Mikey shrugged. “I’m pretty sure they haven’t made it past second base. Frank would have told us if they got any further. Jamia’s not fucking Frank with any of his haircuts”. 

Pete chuckled. He took a dorito out from his chip bag and waved it towards Mikey. Mikey looked down at it, seriously wondering if Pete was trying to feed him like he was an infant. Realizing that, yes, indeed Pete was trying to feed Mikey, he took a small bite from the chip. Pete grinned and ate the rest.

“So did you just break into my house or something?”, Mikey asked.

Pete shook my head. “No, your mom let me in. I told her you were feeling down so I brought you some snacks to put some meat on your bones. She laughed and let me in”. Mikey nodded. That sounded like her.

“Well thanks man, it… it really meant a lot”, Mikey mumbled. He didn’t know why, but he felt a little flustered. Maybe it was because of the way Pete was looking at him, with wide happy eyes. God, Mikey never considered being gay. But being right here with Pete, it did something to Mikey’s heart.

“No problem”, Pete replied. Mikey saw as Pete leaned forward, over the bag of chips and candies and felt his cold hands cup his jaw, pulling him in. It wasn’t fireworks when they kissed. It was more of a cool, mellow, calm than a sparks fly. It flooded MIkey with emotions that he couldn’t quite pin down. It felt amazing though. Before he knew it, they had flopped down onto the cold floor of his room, tussling around. He was literally making out with a boy. He never thought that he would make out with Pete fucking Wentz. They had kissed so many times, but never like this. They suddenly broke apart when they heard the steps of his mother walking around the hallway and cursing about flour prices.

Pete looked at him with wide eyes that were filled with specks of light. They were both breathing heavily and had pink lips. Mikey felt fourteen again. It was great. It was amazing. It was magical.

“We have to keep this a secret, though. You know that, right?”, Pete whispered. “We’ll get so much shit…”, he trailed.

Mikey met his watery eyes. “I know”. He took Pete’s hand and gripped it tightly. “We’ll get through this”.


	23. Good Girls are Bad Girls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SHE SAID FORGET WHAT YOU THOUGHT, CAUSE GOOD GIRLS ARE BAD GIRLS THAT NEVER GOT CAUGHT!!!!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why did I name this chapter this? Why? What it wrong with me??????? AHHHHH
> 
> I am fucking discusting

Alicia had been trying to contact Mikey for a few days. The phone went off in odd hours, asking for a Mikey Way. Mikey told his mother to tell Alicia that he wasn’t there, no matter what hour she called. His mother gave him questioning looks, almost concerning looks. Mike just shrugged it off and asked her how her days were at the Saloon. Shed light right back up and started talking about how Cindy DeLasso accidentally burned a customer’s scalp or how Alex Gantino cussed out Bethany Bennet. Mikey smiled, laughed, and made appropriate comments when necessary while cutting into over cooked chicken.

Alicia tried approaching him in the halls, but he quickly walked the opposite direction. He wasn’t going to hear what she had to say. She blew whatever chance of a friendship the day she called him a faggot. Alicia didn’t deserve to talk to Mikey.

On the third day of Alicia’s frantic calling and attempts to talk to Mikey, she bit the bullet and walked right up to Mikey’s new desk in English. He had purposely moved his seat to the corner of class so he didn’t have to sit next to her any more. He had grieved her loss of friendship and was now angry. How dare she call him _and_ Pete such a terrible word? It’s one thing to insult MIkey, but why’d she drag Pete down in it? Mikey was just glad that nobody heard. He’d be so done if anybody heard what happened.

Mikey didn’t look up from his desk as Alicia called his name. “Mikey”, she whined. MIkey started at his book that he was pretending to read. With all this drama in his life, he had forgotten about how much he liked to read. 

“Mikey, I need to talk to you”, she hissed. Mikey heard the urgency in her voice but chose to ignore it. He wasn’t going to give in. He wasn’t ready to talk to Alicia.

“Mikey, stop ignoring me”, Alicia whined. Mikey saw her hand tap on his desk. “You can fucking hear me. I swear to God, I need to talk to you.” Mikey said nothing back. He had nothing to say to her.

“ _Mikey_ ”. Mikey reread the same line over and over again. “Listen to me!”, she raised her voice. A few heads were looking, Mikey could feel their piercing eyes. He was starting to get tired of this. Kids began settling into class. Soon the teacher would start her lesson and break up their little one way conversation.

“Mikey!”, she almost yelled. It was one ounce short of a yell. “I think I’m pregnant”.

Mikey looked up at that. He felt his stomach drop and his jaw drop. He saw Alicia’s teary eyes and worn out eyeliner. She looked a mess. She looked how Mikey felt right now. He was in complete shock. This was every teenager’s worst fear. He heard faint gasps from his neighboring classmates. The whole school would probably know by tomorrow.

“Fuck”.

***

“So what happened?”, Miket asked. Mikey and Alicia had both skipped their next two classes in favor of going to the local pharmacy and buying a pregnancy test. Immediately.

“What do you mean what happened? We fucked-”

“No, I mean why do you think you’re pregnant?”, Mikey sighed. Tensions were running high right now, and it wasn’t just because of their breakup. Mikey couldn’t be a father. That was unthinkable. He was barely seventeen.

Alicia’s aggression dropped and she looked down at her lap. Mikey saw her wrists churning, one of her nervous ticks. He almost felt bad. He almost felt like hugging her. Almost. “I missed my period. It’s been like a month and half, and by the way, a girl gets her period every month.”

Mikey nodded. Oh. He didn’t know that. He just thought that one day girls just woke up and felt a baby in their stomach. Oops. 

“I’ve got five bucks on me, think that’s enough to buy the test?”, Mikey asked. It was an honest question. He didn’t know how much this shit cost. He never had to think about this before.

“I think so, yeah”, Alicia mumbled while rocking back and forth. Mikey started to feel real bad. Whatever he was feeling was probably ten times worse for Alicia. 

“Hey”, he said, throwing an arm around her and pulling her close. He saw a few tear drops fall from her eyes and he hugged her tighter. It was as if they had never had the argument. Like the kind-of-but-not-really break up happened. “It’ll be okay”.

Alicia’s sobs only grew. “If I am pregnant, what am I gonna do?”.

Mikey sunk back. What was she gonna do? What was _he_ gonna do? He didn’t want a kid to grow up like he did, without a father. “Look, we’re in this together. We’ll figure it out”, Mikey reassured even though he was just as uncertain. God, he had never felt so grown and old than he did then.

“I’ll have to abort it. I can’t be a mother. I’m seventeen. I’m too young to be a mother. I don’t even have a job, how will I pay for all this?”.

“Hey, Alli, don’t worry. I have a job-”

“Mikey, you’re literally a drug dealer. That’s not a real job.”

Mikey sighed. She was right. It wasn’t really a job. It was more like something he just did to help his mother. “We’ll get through this”, was all he thought to say.

The town pharmacy wasn’t too far from the bus stop. It was only a ten minute walk, which the speed walked since they were so anxious. They busted into the pharmacy and hastily bought the test, which was only $2.50. Alicia went to the bathroom in the pharmacy, because she really had no tact. It was one of the things that drew Mikey into her in the first place. 

When Alicia came out, she had a bright smile plastered on her face. It was the biggest smile Mikey ever saw. It was infectious. Mikey began smiling too, he knew the results. 

“Negative!”, she yelled, pumping a fist into the air. The old women at the register gave them a look of pure discussion but Mikey was too happy to even say anything about it. He just smiled and pulled Alicia in for a huge hug, break up be damned.

“This has been the best and worst day of my life”, he muttered into her shoulder. Alicia laughed a small manic laugh that soon turned into a stream of hysteric gigglies on both ends. The pair shuffled back outside and practically ran to the bus stop, pumped up on the fact that Alicia was not pregnant.

The next bust was scheduled to come in fifteen minutes. Shoot. It looked like they had just missed the last bus. They sat at the damp bench, legs tapping and heavy breaths. The shock of the day still hadn’t worn completely off. Mikey really needed to shut down his adrenaline by the time he got to school. That’s when he remembered the pills in his coat pocket. 

“Want one?”he asked Alicia, stupidly holding the baggie out in front of her. Alcia didn’t even ask what they were. She just nodded.

“God, yess”. 

Mikey took the slim white pills out of the bag. Carved into it was the word “Xanax”. Huh. So that’s what it was. He handed one of the pills to Alicia and dry swallowed the other. That would be sure to get him down.

By the time the bus came, Mikey felt soft and loopy. He felt like all his other troubles were no existent. He felt _great_. It was kind of scary how good he felt. As he climbed up the stairs of the bus, he noticed how lost he felt. Alicia and Mikey slipped onto some seats on the bus. Alicia rested her head on Mikey’s shoulder and Mikey rested his head on hers. Just like when they were thirteen in junior high. 

“I’m sorry,” Alicia abruptly said about seven minutes into the drive. “I should have never called you or Pete that word. I felt so bad after I said it. I was just angry. Ever since I was in junior high and I had a crush on you, I thought we’d be together for ever or what ever dumb bullshit little girls think. Even when we were broken up or just hooking up, I still thought we’d get married. I guess I kind of freaked. I’m sorry. We never were actually together, it was a misunderstanding on my part. I’m so sorry”, Alicia slightly slurred. It wasn’t exactly slurred, but she talked real slowly and loosely.

Mikey felt a piece of ice around his heart chip. The bitterness he had towards Alicia quickly faded and he felt bad. He knew that he didn’t actually want to be with Alicia. He had just wanted her to impress Pete. That was fucked up. 

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have led you on like that knowing I might have feelings for someone else”

“It’s okay, I understand now. I had to cool off, but now I get it, or at least I try to. I’m happy for you and Pete”, she exhaled some air. “We friends?”.

Mikey sighed and smiled goofily. “For ever”.


	24. Sugar High

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little party seen cause a high school au isn't complete with out one right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this while drinking like five packets of Thai tea and listening to country music. Quarentine got me weak. Also notes:
> 
> *Sisters of Merecy is goth band? idk exactly what genre they are but there are really good and y'all should check them out!!!   
> * Lucretia my Reflection is a song by Sisters of Mercy   
> *Sugar High is the name from a cult classic film, Empire Records
> 
> Also, if anyone wants to give me ideas about what the write, requests, want's to work together on a fic, or just wants to chat about anything, you can email me at dang.kamsu28@gmail.com !!! I'd love to talk, I ain't got nothing better to do :)

To say that Mikey was on a sugar high was an understatement. He felt so exhausted doing anything with Pete by his side. He felt like he could take on the world with Pete next to him. Everything that he did with Pete felt like a news experience, like it was new. He felt the butterflies, those odd beautiful insects. He felt them.

Pete and him had been sitting next to each other at lunch again. They made long eye contact and giggled at random things. It was like being in junior high talking to your crush. It was a constant churning of his stomach, but in a good way. It was amazing. 

Pete was kind of popular, that was unavoidable. He knew tons of people and even made it in with the jocks because he played soccer. That ment that Pete got invited to lot’s of parties. Mikey went to parties… occasionally. He never really went to normal highschool parties, the ones that Pete got invited too. Kids there probably thought he was dirty. The only kids that ever invited Mikey to places were either strung out stoners (usually met via Frank) or weird goth kids. Those parties were fun, the music was always nice and the kids never judged, but Mikey felt like it was lacking a bit in the activity section. All the stoner kids wanted to do was smoke weed and destroy shit and all the goth kids drank nasty red wine and danced to Sisters Of Mercy. He used to dance with Alicia, but now they are just friends and he sure as hell will not dance with Pete at a goth party (like Pete would want to even go to a goth party). So when Pete invited Mikey to a normal high school party, one without bashing in car windows or dancing on gravestones, he jumped at the offer. He was never interested in parties like that until him and Pete became a thing. He was content going to weird parties with weird acquaintances (plus Frank since Frank is a weirdo and Alicia), but now he wanted to make memories with Pete. 

“It’s not gonna be huge or anything… but it’ll be cool”, Pete offered with a smile.

“Sure, I’ll go. It’ll be better than getting wasted with goth kids to Lucretia my Reflection”, Mikey mused, stirring the carton milk with his pointer finger. Frank snorted. He was going to the party because Jamia invited him as her plus one. 

“Mikey, I’ve seen your CD’s. Those goth parties you scene”, Frank scoffed. 

“All they do is drink red wine. A red wine drunk is not the same as a vodka drunk, Frank”, Mikey informed him. “And don’t talk about my CD collection. It’s not… for discussion”.

“You are totally a closted goth, Mikey”, Frank teased. 

“Hey Frank, have you gotten past third base?”, Mikey asked, raising his eyebrows. Frank immediately went red in the face. 

“No”, Frank admitted. Mikey smiled like a shit-eating friend would. 

“Exactly”.

***

Turns out, the party fucking sucked. Well, at least to Mikey. He hated every minute of it. It was one of those parties that were integrated, as long as you weren’t a delinquent they would let you in, meaning that the popular kids ruled the dance floor and party games while all the weirdos (not even real weirdos, just weirdos compared to popular kids) all convened outside on the lawn. Mikey soon found himself out there, since he knew so many people. Maybe he was a weirdo.

Some genius, maybe it was Gabe, it was probably fucking Gabe, decided it would be a good idea to play a game. Mikey didn’t know why Gabe was here. Gabe was kind of popular for a weirdo, he just knew everybody. He didn’t _have_ to be here. Mikey wished he was a good half foot taller because right now he’d totally punch Gabe in the face. There was only one girl forever, two guys, so the bottle was off the table. No one wanted to risk kissing another dude. Instead, they chose the second best party game, truth or dare. 

Mikey took a seat next to Frank and Alicia. Him and Alicia were good now, and quite truthfully he was glad. Him and Alicia would always be friends, he couldn’t imagine life without her. The circle was fairly large and consisted of every face that Mikey ever knew, except for Pete. Pete was inside with the more popular kids getting drunk on wine coolers instead of being outside, smoking joints with the school’s weirdos, stoners, and future J.Ds. 

Mikey found himself laughing a bit. Someone had brought out a bottle of vodka, no chaser, and passed it around the circle a few times. Mikey was more than positive that he’d wake up with mono, but it’d be worth it. He was genuinely having a fun time. He got to see Frank lick his own toe, Gabe admit that he watched every episode of Gilmore Girls, and many other stunts. He was just glad that nobody asked him the dreaded ‘truth or dare’. He had a lot to hide, so he probably wouldn’t choose the truth. Just as Brendon Urie finished doing a two minute handstand, he heard Brendon’s booming voice call his name.

“Truth or dare'', Brendon asked Mikey. Mikey had become acquainted with Brendon (and Ryan since he tagged along alot) after dealing him his pot every monday. He was one of the few kids that wasn’t a complete shit head and actually showed up on time. He bought a lot of pot, though. Tons of it. Enough to keep Bert in business. 

“Dare?”, Mikey said. He had too many secrets to pick from the truth. 

Brendon’s face contorted into a nasty wicked smile. Ryan, who was sitting next to Brendon seemed to sense something because he looked horrified and jabbed Brendon’s side. “Ouch, fuck you, Ryan. Um…. let’s see. I dare you to… hm.... Oh look! There’s Pete! I dare you to kiss Pete!”.

The crowd erupted with gasps and laughs and Mikey and Alicia made awkward eye contact. Alcia gave Mikey a small sad smile as if to say ‘sorry, man’. To Mikey’s horror, Pete had fled from the hordes of cheerleaders and jocks playing spin the bottle to the lawn. He was waking up to the circle, smiling but far enough to not hear the dare.

“Kiss him!”, Brendon yelled, breaking Mikey’s thoughts. Brendond stood up, wobbling and giggling while pointing to Pete and yelling something that Mikey couldn’t make out. Ryan tried to calm Brendon down in vain, tugging at his arms to get him to sit again to no avail. The crowd cheered louder as Brendon shouted more and more. Mikey saw Pete’s eyes squint and give Brendon a look as he approached. As he heard the cheers and seeing the wide eyed look on Mikey, Pete seemed to figure it out and became just as wide eyed as Mikey.

“Kiss your boy, Mikey, Peter Wentz!”, Brendon called. Ryan had stopped trying to restrain him as Brendon jumped up and down drunkenly. Mikey really wanted to punch somebody in the face now. He felt his face grow red and heat up. It only got worse as Ryan, the only one seeming to be trying to control the situation, grew tired of being responsible and began laughing along with the crowd as well. Fuck.

Pete’s deer in headlight look only lasted for a split second and a smug smile perched on his face. It should have made Mikey feel better, but it just made him more nervous for what was to come. Pete strood towards the circle and tapped on Mikey’s shoulder. He grabbed Mikey’s arm and hoisted him onto his feet. Mikey looked into Pete’s eyes for a bit two seconds before he found himself engulfed in Pete’s arms, lips touching. To say Mikey was shocked was an understatement. He loved kissing Pete, but he was scared about what people would think and about what would happen if one of the popular kids from inside would happen to look at and see. They’d kick Pete’s ass.

As Pete pulled apart, Mikey just began to register the loud cheers coming from the circle. That’s when Mikey realized that he was safe. He knew these people here wouldn’t care. This circle, his friends and acquaintances, were his family. They’d never judge him for something like that. It was the people inside the house that would. 

Brendon was cheering the loudest. He was also smirking like an idiot and pumping his fist into the air. Pete gave Mikey a short grin before bolting straight into Brendon, tackling him into the floor. The boy’s playfully scuffled around for a bit before Ryan pulled Brendon off Pete. Mikey smiled as the adrenaline from the kiss died down.

“Dude, what was that?”, Frank asked, hitting his shoulder.

“Was what?”Mikey asked, quaking a brow. Frank just laughed into his beer and shook his head. 

“You and Pete. I coulda sworn I saw spark fucking fly”, Frank explained in hushed whisperes. He waved around his beer in the hand that wasn’t intertwined with Jamia’s and pointed it at Pete. “I’m not gonna like being judged or anything”.

Mikey smiled. “Let’s talk about this latter, right now I have something to take care off.” Mikey waited until the circle quilted down a little before hollering, “Hey Brendon!”. Brendon looked at Mikey with a smug look, egging him to go on. “Truth or Dare?”.

“Dare”, Brendon chirped because he was too proud to choose Truth. Everyone knew that Brendon Urie never chose the truth. 

“I dare you to kiss Ryan”, Mikey smirked. Brendon went pale and Ryan went red. This was gonna be good.


	25. Party Rock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Party Rockers left the house tonight, everybody have a good time
> 
> OR... the boys leave the party earlier and chill at a stinky playground

It turns out that Brendon Urie and Ryan Ross were just like twelve year old girls. Pete had decided he wanted to leave the party early and managed to convince Gabe to let him borrow the truck. Gabe was drunk out of his mind and actually agreed, so that left Pete driving, Mikey in shotgun, and Brendon and Ryan in the backseat. Mikey didn’t know exactly where Pete was taking them, but he recognised a lot of the homes and noticed they were only about ten minutes from where he lived. 

Brendon and Ryan were in the back seat giggling and singing along to the Madonna that Pete had started playing. Brendon had also tried lighting a joint to which Pete promptly yelled at him for. “Gabe doesn’t allow smoking!”, Pete had yelled. The car had swerved and both of the boys started to laugh. Mikey thinks that they are plenty high already.

“So like, Pete… Mikey… you guys are like cute”, Brendon giggles.

“Shut up, Brendon. We kissed once, it was a game”, Pete responded.

“But _if_ you were to get together, you’d be cute”, Brendon started back up again. “Don’t even front. I know you two are a thing. I can just tell! Don’t worry your , secret is safe with me.” Brendon paused and waited for any noises of disagreement. When he got none, he laughed. “I fucking knew it! Mikey, Pete has been fucking pinning after you for months. Fucking months. We used to tease him so badly! Congrats man, you chose a really shitty fish in a sea of mediocre fish”.

Mikey didn’t respond but rather bit his lips to hold back the smile. He normally wouldn’t be so giddy, but it just felt nice to know that if he ever were to go public with Pete, there would be people there to support him. It could have also been the few beers he had making him lose and happy, but it was mostly the support. Of course, they could never go public because kids at school would totally kick his ass, but it was a nice thought that they’d be some people… or one person… just Brendon.

“I’d do the wedding cake”, Ryan offered. Two people. 

“Ryan, the only baking you do is with green leaves”, Pete slightly snipped back. He glared at the sophomore boys in the back seat. “Why’d I agree to take you guys with us again?”.

“One, Brendon is the stoner. Two, because we are your friends”.

Pete scoffed. “Or so you think. Keep talking like that and you can walk home. Also, you’re not fooling anyone. I see your eyes, all red and puffy at lunch. I’m not fucking stupid”, Pete chuckled while putting the car in park. With the help of the streetlights Mikey could see the outline of the playground that him and Frank frequented. The one that Pete refused to go to because he claimed it was childish.

“Pete, you are the dumbest fuck I know”, Brendon supplied as they all got out the car. “Also why are we at a park? Aren’t these for five year olds?”.

“Exactly why we’re here”, Pete snickered. He looked at Mikey and smiled. “So what’s it that you and Frank always do here? It looks like a shitty playground to me”. Mikey returned the smile and shook his head.

“We go to the top of the playground and claim it. We smoke cigarettes and scare little kids away”, Mikey explained with a grin. Pete wiggled his eyebrows and titled his head towards the playground equipment. That’s all it took for the two of them to start in a dead run to the playground. Mikey got there first and climbed up the top of the slide. Pete was a bit slower, grabbing two large sticks and handing them to Mikey before hoisting himself up. 

“What are these for?”, Mikey asked while examining the stick. Pete grinned.

“For this”, he said while jabbing Brendon in the head. Mikey looked down to see Brendon and Ryan hanging around the slide. Brendon, who had tried to climb up the slide, fell back when prodded onto the mulch.

“Oww, what the fuck, Wentz?”, he asked. Pete just laughed.

“No little kids! Mikey get you cigarettes!”. Mikey pulled out a pack of mostly crumbled cigarettes and found two that weren’t completely fucked up. He lit them as Pete continued to hit Brendon with the stick and passed it to Pete. Pete smiled and hastily took a drag, launching him into a fit of coughing.

“Fuck cigarettes, man”, he cursed. “Shitty for your lungs”. 

Mikey shrugged as he took a drag. He inhaled the smoke and night air and noticed how lovely the night sky was. It was probably midnight and the stars were dancing. Despite the yelping of Brendon and cursing of Pete, Mikey thought it was quite peaceful. He had an awesome boyfriend and made some new friends. It was a nice night.


	26. Crashingdown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Get caught like a cot like a cod like a fish

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to finnish this up and focus on my other fics.

“Hey Babe”, Pete grinned as he pushed Mikey up against his locker. Now that they were both on talking terms, Pete stopped by his locker more often. Mikey appreciated it. Even if he couldn’t kiss Pete in school like how he used to kiss Alicia, it was still nice to see Pete in between classes.

“Pete, get off! Someone could see," Mikey whispered. He wanted to be angry at Pete or at least appear angry, but with that big goofy grin he was sporting, it was hard to stay the least bit upset. 

“Relax, nobody’s even in this hall. It’s so early. What are you even doing here?”, Pete asked. Mikey could ask him the same, it was thirty minutes before class started. Pete was typically late unless he had soccer practice in the morning. But it wasn’t soccer season, it was the middle of December.

“I have to stop by my Trig class. I’m doing some make up work”, Mikey answered while sliding out from underneath Pete. He turned to his locker and started fiddling around his books. Mikey knew that with all the skipping and coming late to class, he was a little behind in class. The teacher offered to give him extra credit if he rang out the erasers in the morning and did all the make up work. Mikey happily agreed. His mother would skin him if he failed a class.

“Aw, Mikey Way, the little goodie goodie”, Pete teased while ruffling Mikey’s hair. Pete liked to mess with Mikey’s hair and it bothered Mikey to no end. He spent a good hour in the mornings trying to get it to look decent, all for Pete to mess it up the second he walked into the building. If Pete didn’t have dreads, Mikey would totally ruin Pete’s hair. It’d be revenge.

“I’m just as much a goodie goodie as you are academically proficient”, Mikey retorted with a scoff. It wasn’t a lie. Pete was a pretty academically proficient student, not much special. Mikey wasn’t a bad kid or anything, he just wasn’t the model kid either. 

“Touche”. Peter opened his own locker. “Anyways, I’m here because of a similar predicament. I may or may not have gotten morning detention?”.

“May have?”Mikey asked, quirking an eyebrow. “Whatcha do?”.

“Nothing, just like… you know… talking back and stuff”, Pete shrugged. He gave Mikey a quick peck on the check and headed down the hallway. “Catch you later, Way”.

Mikey smiled to himself silently. He took out his Trig book from his locker and a few notebooks for the day. As he took out his English notebook, he noticed a bag fall from his locker. He panicked slightly as he picked it up, identifying it as a bag of weed that he had to sell. He must have accidentally left it in the locker on Friday. Mikey was usually good about getting the drugs out of his locker by Friday afternoon. It was common knowledge that sniffer dogs occasionally stopped by on weekends to sniff out drugs. He was just lucky that they hadn’t chosen to sniff this weekend. Mikey sighed as he put the bag into his back pocket, scratching his brain for who he was supposed to deliver to. Hmm… Wasn’t it that Quin kid, the asshole?

Mikey sighed again when he realized that it was Quin. Fuck. Mikey did not like Quin. Plus, he was pretty sure that Bert said that Quin would meet him early at school on Monday, which was today. Shoot. Mikey had to make it to trig, but at the same time he had to deliver Bert’s shit.

Mikey stood at the corner of the Biology hallway and Chemistry hallway for a few minutes waiting for Quin. He checked his watch and decided that if Bert didn’t make it in five more minutes that he’d just leave and go to class. He was really wishing he didn’t have to do this. Helping Bert out was becoming a big hassle that he couldn’t handle. It was getting to him. He was missing a lot of class and risking a lot. Maybe he’d quit. Sure, it was bringing in money for his family, but Mikey could just get a normal job. He didn’t _have_ to do this.

Mikey finally heard footsteps and smiled. Thank God, Quin would finally make it. Mikey leaned against the wall as he waited for Quin to near out the hallway and make an appearance. As Quin’s footsteps grew louder, Mikey soon realized that there were multiple footsteps. 

“There, that's him”, Quin beamed as he bustled from around the corner. A slew of administrators soon appeared, right at Queen's feet. Mikey stood there, gapping and wide eyed. He spotted the smug look on Quin’s face and knew what was going on. He was being ratted out.


	27. Chapter 27

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The after math and sad stuff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo what is up, my dudes? I went back and fixed some stuff with the previous chapter. Also, I started another fic and put my Gerard/Frank fic on hiatias as it no longer sparks intrest. I'll propably get around to it later, but as for right now, my main goal is to finnish this fic up and continue my other fic. Also:
> 
> Please stay safe. If you are attending a protest, I wish the best for you and I hope that no harm goes your way. Please do research and bring water and mil if avaible. Also, I hope y'all are staying safe with the whole Pandamic. \
> 
> \- Dang Su Kam

“Why?”, was all she asked when they got into the car. “Two years ago with the fighting, I understood. But why this?”. The administrators had been nice about their process, it wasn’t like when Mikey first got suspended with Gabe and Pete. Gabe had been a dick to the administrator and Pete wasn’t exactly quite either, so Mikey gets why the principle seemed pretty tired of it all. This time they had just signed some papers off and told Mikey that he was gonna get suspended and was lucky they didn’t call the cops on him. They said he had a pretty good future ahead and didn’t want to ruin it. Plus, they had thought that Mikey was carrying the dope for himself and wasn’t selling it, so it wasn’t a big deal. It was his mother that Mikey was scared of.

“I just felt like we needed some extra cash…”, he tried to explain but the words got a little caught up in the back of his throat, he already knew it was stupid. Or at least his mom would think it’s stupid.

“Is that where all those twenty that I randomly found around the house were coming from?”, she asked while taking a sharp turn. Mikey tried not to jerk forward to much.

“Yes”.

His mother made a ticking noise with her tongue. “It’s a good thing I’m terrible at driving with one hand. If not I would have already slapped you”. Mikey didn’t respond, instead he just stared out the window watching the trees turn into blobs of greens.

“Don’t you ever do something like that again, you hear me? You’re lucky the administrators thought it was just for your own personal use, not anything else. Count your blessings, boy”.

*

“Snitches get stitches, seriously Mikes, I’ll beat that _little bitch_ up for you”. Mikey suppressed his laugh. Gabe had called him as soon as he heard that Mikey was suspended again. 

“Do I just break off I’m-a-princess-come-save-me?”, Mikey deadpanned into the phone. 

“No. I just don’t like people messing with my friends. It’s almost the same as if they messed with me”, Gabe responded, the voice hardly going static at all. Mikey pulled the phone closer to his ear. His mother watched him from the side of her eyes with that _look_. The scary mom looked. Mikey knew she wasn’t mad at him, but rather disappointed. Mikey also knew that she felt a little sad that Mikey felt like he needed to turn to that.

“I think I’m good, Gabe.” Mikey wasn’t one to try and start up any more trouble. He rather just bite the suspension and then go back to school like nothing happened. He certainly didn’t want any trouble with Quin or any of Quin’s friends. Mikey sighed when his mom gave him a twil of fingers.

“Gotta go, Gabe. See you soon”. Mikey hung up the phone and walked to the couch that his mother was sitting on. She was reading Cosmo and smoking a cigarette.

“Was that Gaberiel?”, she asked without looking up.

“Yeah. He just wanted to know what was going on”, Mikey answered. His mother nodded sternly and didn’t say anything more. Mikey lounged around on the couch before deciding that he was going to have to stop. It was just too much. He couldn’t keep this up, out of respect for his mother and hisself. It was a bad idea to start with and he shouldn't have listened to Bert. 

After a few minutes, the phone rang again and his mother hoped of the couch and sprung towards the phone. Mikey heard as the phone detached from the wall and he heard it click as she answered. There were a few muffled words and his mother shot Mikey a serious look, warning him to go to his room. Mike felt a little upset, he wasn’t five. His mother just couldn’t kick him out of the living room, but nonetheless he left the living room and hurried up the steps to his room. 

Mikey layed around his bedroom for a while, occasionally leaving his bed to change a mixtape or stretch his lips. He heard his mother gasp and raise her voice a few times from the thin walls that separated the house, but other than that he couldn’t gather enough information to put together what was going on. It sounded pretty serious, and that worried him.

Mikey drifted off into sleep, or at least he assumed he did. He woke up abruptly with a knock on his door. He sat up and shook off some of the covers. He briefly wondered what time it was before realizing he didn’t care and it didn’t matter.

“Come in”, he called. The door slowly creaked open and Mikey saw a disheveled Gerard creep into the room. Gerard looked greasy, he had bags under his eyes, and looked like he was crying. He was wearing a torn up grey hoodie and fuzzy pajamas. He looked terrible.

Mikey immediately lifted the covers up from his bed and Gerard walked over to the bed and tucked himself under. It was like they were in elementary again. Mikey automatically sensed that something was wrong, but he decided to wait for Gerard to initiate the conversation first. He wasn’t gonna pressy anything.

“I broke up with Bert”.

“Oh my God, I’m sorry, Gerard”, Mikey said, embracing his sniffling brother. He never knew that Bert and Gerard were a thing, but who knows.

“Yeah, I just realized that he was a bad influence on me. I mean, we’re both kind of bad influences on eachother. He got me into some pills and I got him into drinking. It was just a bad situation”, Gerard croaked softly. If he wasn’t resting his head on Mikey’s shoulder, Mikey wouldn’t have heard him. 

“I think I’m gonna take a semester off from school, I just can’t focus on it right now. I’m gonna detox and then get back on my feet”. Gerard nuzzled against Mikey’s shoulder and took a sharp breath. “I’m not like… addicted I don’t think. I just need to cut out the Xanax and slow down on drinking, you know? Range it in. I barely passed this semester and I missed so many classes since I was hung over. I just gotta range it in. Reboot my body”. Mikey grunted a response and stroked Gerard’s hair. God it was greasy. A shower and tub of ice cream was much needed.

“Listen Mikes, don’t get involved with drugs or drinking. I don’t know if you have experimented before, but just know it’s dangerous. And stay away from Bert Mckraken. He’s nothing but trouble”.

Mikey nodded his head even though Gerard couldn’t see him. He continued stroking Gerard’s greasy black hair and decided that once this hallmark moment was over, he was forcing Gerard to shower. “I won’t”, Mikey whispered even though it was a lie. He was already in trouble.


	28. Hop Town Like A Skippin' Stone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mikey and Bert have a heated conversation...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the writting quality on this story has gone down quicker than my will to live :) ENJOY (or try to)

Gerard had moped around most of the three days that Mikey'd been suspended. Mikey had begged his mother not to tell Gerard the real reasoning he was suspended and surprisingly, she respected Mikey’s wishes. Gerard had been a bit bummed why Mikey wouldn’t tell him, but Mikey was pretty sure he got over it pretty quickly. 

Mikey had taken it upon him to try and hunt Bert down. Mikey had decided he was done. He was one hundred percent done with Bert’s antics. It was hindering him and getting him in trouble. He was done. Mikey had found out from Gabe’s friend’s friend’s younger sister that Bert tended to spend Sunday afternoons at his own home (which Mikey found out was a rarity, Bert was hardly ever at his own house). So on Sunday afternoon, Mikey begged Gerard for the keys to the car and recklessly drove to Bert’s dinky crack house. He knocked on the door and on the fourth knock, a slightly disheveled and smug Bert answered the door.

“Bert, I don’t wanna push anymore. I quit”, Mikey firmly stated. Bert just rolled his eyes and cocked his hip against the doorway.

“And why would that be?”, he snorted disrespectfully. Mikey refrained from rolling his eyes. Bert seemed to be completely sober right now and was angry. Not a good time to piss him off. “This isn’t about your brother, is it?”.

“It’s not about Gerard. Dealing is too much trouble. I’m running late to class, getting into trouble, and I got suspended. It’s not working out. I have the cash from last week and I’m done”. Mikey fumbled around in his pockets for the money and stuck it out. Bert looked down at the wad of twenties with disgust and snatched it. 

“Good bye, Bert”, Mikey snarked before swiftly turning around and stepping down the steps of Bert’s porch. Mikey’s foot barely met the first step before he felt his collar get pulled back. He really shouldn’t have worn a hoodie. 

Bert jerked back Mikey’s hoodie, causing him to stumble about as Bert pulled him back. “I have something you might want to see _fag_ ”, Bert hissed in Mikey ear. Mikey jumped at the use of the slur. He didn’t think anybody outside of his newly founded circle knew about his sexuality thing. Also, was Bert the one banging his brother just a week ago? Hypocritical much? Nonetheless, Mikey hesitantly entered Bert’s house with a scowl plastered on his face. 

“What is it?”, he demanded coolly. Bert just shook his head and grabbed his arm, dragging Mikey down a hall. Mikey willingly followed Bert deeper into the shit show that was the Mckraken residency. Glass shards, empty cans, trash, and fast foot bags littered every corner. Mikey was able to catch a glimpse of the living room. Two random guys were sleeping half on a busted up sofa and half on the floor. It looked extremely uncomfortable and Mikey had to remind himself that they were probably so wasted that they didn’t feel any discomfort.

Bert pulled Mikey into a small room with a cheap wood frame twin bed and a rickety drawer. Bert smiled as he strood over to the drawer and slowly pulled it open. Mikey could barely see what was in the drawer, but there seemed to be a ton of loose pens and a few papers. Mikey leaned against the door frame and watched Bert as he pulled out a bunch of papers. Bert grinned as he flung them up for Mikey to see. Mikey’s eyes widened in horror as he saw what was printed on the pictures. It was of him and Pete against the shed behind Pete’s house. Pete was pressed against the shed and Mikey’s arm was wrapped around Pete’s neck and waist, their lips firmly pressed against each other.

“Listen here, Way'', Bert growled. “I don’t have time to find another dumbass to push at the highschool. It’s not just me you are working for. By working for me you are also working for the people above me… and you don’t want to fuck with those people. Those people will have me screwed if I don’t deliver. I have to deliver. That means you have to deliver. If you stop, Bob will beat you to a pulp. You’ll be bloody and bruised in the corner of the fight and sixth. Bob doesn’t push but he punches! So you better sell these fucking drugs! And if that’s not enough pressure, cause I know that you Ways have gotten beat up before, I’ll post these up on every single wall of the school. It’s fucking black mail Mikey Way! You _and_ Wentz will get expelled for it, the school doesn’t give a shit if you weren’t the ones who put it up. You’ll get expelled anyways. So don’t test me, Way! I’ll come around with the normal order of baggies and you best fucking sell them!”, Bert threatened through clenched teeth. 

“How the fuck did you find those?”, Mikey hissed. He was getting mad. How _did_ Bert get those? Was he fucking stalking Mikey? What the hell? “Were you stalking me and Wentz?”.

Bert’s face twisted into a sly smile. “Bob gave me a tip that you and Wentz were a thing of some sorts. He said he heard you and your girlfriend or what ever have an argument about you being a fag or some shit. I may have taken a few photography classes before I dropped out, so I figured why not pay you and Wentz’s date night a little trip”.

Mikey felt his face flush. He was a bit embarrassed. He didn’t need Bert seeing wat him and Pete got up too. He was also mad, mad as hell. How dare Bert invade his privacy like that and how dare Bert blackmail Mikey like that? 

“Fuck you Bert”, Mikey cursed. He felt a strange urge to shove Bert and punch him as hard as he could. He had a few inches on Bert and Bert was emaciated as hell, he could take him if he wanted to. But then Bert would just post the pictures around school anyways.

“Yeah, Fuck me Mikey Way. I’m on top of the mother fucking game! You can’t escape me. I’ll be here bothering you until you die or hop town! So think twice before fucking with me again, get the fuck out of my house”, Bert demanded. Mikey just stared at Bert very angrily. “You heard me, fucking leave!”, Bert screamed. Mikey felt his cool leave for a hot second and slammed Bert into the wall, a loud thud thundering as the shorter crashed and just as quickly as the anger spilled out, it had left. Mikey hurried out the room, leaving a slightly dazed Bert hurling curses.

As Mikey slammed the car door and jammed the keys into the wheel, frustrated and stressed, an erie thought suddenly crossed his mind. He replayed the little tangent Bert had gone on before he had shoved him. “Until you die or hop town”, Bert said. Mikey thought about his options and suddenly moving to the city sounded an awful lot nicer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just wanted to say, I'm aware on how stupid and dramtic this all seems. I'm sorry


	29. Er'y body gettin' drunk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tik tok on the clock but the party don't stop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I prolly won't update for a while cause I'm getting my nails done and there gonna be long as hell so I can't type :(

When Mikey got home, he was met with the kaotic scene of Frank trying to cook a can of soup in the Way’s kitchen. Frank was wearing a pink apron with frills that Mikey was pretty much sure was purchased in 1986 and hunched over the electric oven, squinting his eyes at the can of soup. Mikey immediately recognised the soup can as Campbell and chicken noodle, which put some suspicion on his mind. Frank was a vegetarian. 

“Frank, whatcha doing in there?”, Mikey called out from the kitchen doorway. Frank jumped a bit at the sound of Mikey’s voice and bugged his eyes out in surprise. Mikey would have laughed if he wasn’t so confused. 

“I’m making Gerard some soup”, Frank answered casually before getting back to hunching over the oven. Mikey didn’t drop it so easily. Since when did Frank just make soup for his brother? Frank normally wouldn’t be within six feet of meet unless it was dire. 

“Wait… why are you making soup for my brother?”, Mikey asked. He watched as Frank stirred the soup and messed around with the temperature knob. Frank honestly looked like he never had cooked anything in his life. Which, by looking back on it, Frank probably never had. 

Frank shot Mikey a pouting look from the oven. “He’s sad, Mikey”, Frank frowned. 

_“Why is he sad?”_. Mikey drew out the words, making sure Frank knew he wasn’t playing games. He didn’t have time for this back and forth game that Frank was playing. Mikey was not having a good week. He got suspended, found out his brother was a borderline alcoholic, and was black mailed by Bert Mckraken. This was _not_ his week. He was not trying to beat around the bush.

“It wasn’t me”, Frank defended, like that was what Mikey was pressed about. “He was just… okay you can’t get mad at me”, Frank warned. He threw his hands up innocently and gave Mikey a ‘it totally wasn’t my fault’ look that made him scarred. “So I came over looking for you. I scored some vodka and I wanted to go to the playground to get drunk-”

“On a Sunday afternoon?”

“Shut up, Mikeyway. You woulda come if you were here”, Frank retorted and Mikey bit his lip and didn’t say anything. He knew it was true. “Anyways, I saw that your mom’s car was out so I let myself in and yelled ‘Yo, Mikeyway let’s get drunk at the playground’ and was surprised when your greasy brother trotted up the stairs and said ‘what are you saying ‘bout my brother.” Frank inhaled and shot Mikey an empathetic look, making Mikey’s heart drop. He knew what was coming next.

“I told him about our vodka escapades and Mary Janes adventures and he sort of… got sad”, Frank admitted sheepishly. “He told me about his own personal issues with booze and pills. And… I think you might wanna sell the hard stuff anymore, like the Xanax. And we might wanna be more secretive about our own habits. You know like, let’s only smoke at my place. To make it easier on Gee”.

Mikey stood in the doorway, baffled. He really wasn’t expecting this. He thought it was sweet that Frank was so invested and on board with helping Gerard. At the same time, he really couldn’t deal with this right now. He also didn’t want to explain why he couldn’t stop dealing. 

“Yeah, yeah. That sounds great Frank”, Mikey said, watching Frank’s figure carefully. Mikey felt a little dizzy. This was all a bit much. He felt like falling. 

“You okay, Mikes?”Frank asked.

“Yeah, I’m just gonna, gonna go upstairs”.


	30. Blackmail

“So what you’re telling me is that Bert is basically blackmailing you with a bunch of pictures of you and Pete getting it on-- which by the way is absolutely disgusting-- and is threatening to put them in the school to expel you and Pete because he doesn’t wanna find another kid to work his hustle. God, that sounds fucking sad”, Gabe whinned while flopping down onto Mikey’s small bed. Mikey didn’t know who to turn to to talk to, but he knew he had to talk to somebody. He couldn’t talk to Frank about his issues, not with Frank being so invested in trying to help Gerard get sober. He’d been around every day to help out Gerard since the day Mikey had gone over to Bert’s, and that was almost a week ago. Mikey also didn’t want to talk to Pete. Pete would freak out about the pictures and have a panic attack, Mikey didn’t want that to happen. So his only option left was no other than Gabe Saporta.

“It is. I don’t know why he can’t find another pusher”, Mikey agreed, sighing and taking a seat next to Gabe on the bed. He had told Gabe everything, even about his semi-secret relationship with Pete. Gabe had shook his head and muttered something that sounded incredibly similar to ‘knew it’ but other than that didn’t tease like Mikey thought he would.

“It’s because he’s lazy. He also knows how to manipulate you. It’s easier for him to use you”. Gabe titled his head back and stared at the ceiling. “But I don’t think that those pictures would get you two expelled, not if you explained-”

“Kassy Ronue got expelled when her ex passed out naked photographs of her to the football team. They didn’t even care about her side of the story. And you know how this town is, the old chatolic school admins will basically stone us to death”, Mikey groaned. Gabe kissed his teeth as he seemed to grasp what Mikey was saying.

“Want me to beat him up?”, Gabe offered. He looked half way at Mikey and Mikey was able to spot the worry on Gabe’s face. This was the good thing about having Gabe on your side, he knew when to get serious and was down to tumble.

“Thanks for the offer, but no. If anything, I wanna beat him up. He’s only like 5’6, I can take him”, Mikey sighed, biting his inner gum. “But that wouldn’t help, would it?”.

“No, I guess not. So what are you going to do, just wait until you graduate then stop?”.

Mikey felt his stomach churn. It was the kind of churn that burns a little because you know that you’re gonna have to say something you didn’t want to. “He kind of alluded to me having to deal with him even after highschool… I might have to… have to leave.”

“Leave?”.

“Leave town”, Mikey clarified. Gabe seemed to take to that and sat up.

“Leave town! Are you crazy!”, he nearly yelled. Mikey jumped before pulling his finger to his lips and tried shushing him. “Leave town? Are you crazy?”, Gabe repeated but in a whisper.

“Yeah, I might have to. I think I’ll leave after graduation, that way I’ll have my diploma. You can’t tell anybody about this, though”, Mikey warned, although he knew he didn’t have to. Gabe Saporta was not a snitch by any means. It’d be real hypocritical for him to snitch on Mikey since Gabe had been on the other end of the same conversation multiple times. _‘Mikey, don’t tell the teacher that I was the one who tripped the kid’, ‘Mikey if you tell my mom I’ve been smoking, I’ll break your twiggy legs’, ‘Snitches get stitches, plus, failing one test isn’t like the end of the world’._

“I won’t. I owe it to you”, Gabe reassured, smiling a bit. He was probably remembering all the things he had said to Mikey over the years that they’d know each other. His smile was soon whipped off and he grimaced. “What about Pete?”.

“I--”, he paused for a brief moment, “it’s for his own good, Gabe. I’ll write him a note if I have to leave”, Mikey stated. He gulped and looked down at his shoes. He didn’t want to leave Pete. He spent so much time fighting with Pete just to lose him once he finally got him. It was going to suck. It did suck.   
When Mikey stopped staring at his shoes, he looked up and saw Gabe gazing at him with sad, starry eyes. Mikey knew it then. He’d have to leave.


	31. 9 to 5

“What’s in the duffel, Way?”, Frank asked coldly, sneaking up against Mikey in the foyer. Mikey wasn’t planning on leaving today or anything, he was just about to pack up his shoes just in case he had to leave. It had been a few weeks since Mikey’s conversation with Gabe and graduation was nearing. Frank had been over a lot and didn’t seem to appreciate the fact that Mikey has not stopped dealing. Mikey _wished_ he could have stopped, but he knew he couldn’t. Plus, now he actually needed the money so he could skip town. Frank had been getting moodier and more passive aggressive the more Mikey stated he couldn’t stop dealing.

"Nothing", Mikey hastily said. He didn't want to deal with Frank right now. 

“I can call your bullshit, Mikey”, Frank snarked. His arms were crossed and he was flexing his muscles. He looked real tough standing in the Way’s small kitchen in a pink apron and spatula in hand. Really intimidating. 

Mikey had been friends with Frank for a good while. Mikey remembers when Frank was twelve and transfering from Saint John’s K-8 School into the jungle known as public middle school. He remembers sitting at his lunch table, iddily stirring his star in the school provided milk and watching this kid with long shaggy black hair look around for an empty table. Gabe Saporta talking his ear off about who was going with who and whatnot and Pete Wentz was trying to smoke a cigarette under the lunch table without the admin suspending him again. Frank knew when Mikey was bullshitting, but Mikey wouldn’t go down without a fight.

“Then you’d know there isn’t any”, Mikey said calmly, crossing his arms. He pushed himself up against the kitchen wall and propped his leg by the wall. He was trying to keep calm, although he allowed himself to stare daggers at Frank while Frank flipped his pancake. He was probably going to make a nice plate of them and bring it down to Gerard. 

“Now that, that my friend is bullshit”. Frank returned to crossing his arms and staring daggers back at Mikey. “Don’t bullshit me. I know what you are doing. You know it’s not helping your brother one bit”, Frank spat. 

Mikey rolled his eyes for what felt like the fifty millionth time that day. It was always Gerard. It was never Mikey. Never about Mikey. Never. It was always gonna be Gerard. Nobody gave a shit about Mikey.

“Yeah, well it’s helping me”, Mikey countered. He felt like an asshole for saying it. He hated how he insinuated that he didn’t care that he was hurting Gerard. He really did hate that it hurt Gerard. But it was true, it was helping Mikey, and Mikey needed all the help he could get. It was also helping his mother pay the bills, and that’s all that mattered. “And I’ve talked about it with Gerard. So don’t go feeling high and mighty on your high horse thinking that by being a dick to me you are helping Gerard”. 

“You don’t get what I am trying to say Mikey”, Frank said. He took a deep breath. Mikey could see him untense, his pierced up eyebrows stopped twitching and his eyes seemed 50% less buggy. Buggy but not as much. “Listen, Mikey”. He spoke calmly, like if a change of demeanor was going to make Mikey more receptive to what he was saying. “Your lifestyle is making it hard for Gerard to leave. He gets anxiety, you know. He starts thinking, ‘what if on a day when I am feeling incredibly low I go into Mikey’s room and steal some of his stash?’ or ‘I could really use the Xanax Mikey is selling’. That’s what Gerard is thinking. Plus, it doesn’t help that he worries about you!”

Mikey gulped. He knew Gerard worried about him but he didn’t like to think about it.

“Look, Frank, you aren’t really one to preach about sobriety. I know what you do on the weekends”. It was true, Frank Iero was a big fucking stoner. Also, it wasn’t like Mikey was a drug addict or anything. It was just some weed, some beer, and a Xannie when times got really tough.

Frank grabbed his hair frantically and twisted his fingers through it. He groaned as he said “You aren’t getting it. I never said go sober. I said stop selling. You wanna do drugs, then go do them! Nobody is stopping you! Just stop selling!”.

“Get another preacher in the church house because I know that you are just as much of a sinner as the rest of us! You try to act like you’re better, when in reality you’re just a dick. I’m gonna stop selling once I get enough money to hop town! God!”. Mikey threw his hands in the air.

Frank’s eyes widened with the shock of the new information. He actually dropped the spatula. “You can’t leave, Mikey”, Frank stated calmly. The boys stared at each other for a few minutes, the pancake next to Frank burning as it was left unattended. 

“Why?”, Mikey asked. “Are you my father?”.

“No. I am not your father. Thank God, I don’t know how your mother even wakes in the morning having you as a kid! But I am your friend. And I’m Gerard’s friend as well. I know how much your disappearance will hurt him-”

“What about how much it will hurt me!?”, Mikey yelled, losing his signature cool. It was always Gerard. It was always Gerard. It was always Gerard. “You think I wanna leave!? I wanna leave my family? My friends? No! I love you all! Even as I’m arguing with you, Frank, I’d still take a bullet for you! I _can’t_ stay here. I _can’t_ ”, Mikey emphasized, hoping Frank would catch his drift. 

Frank kind of gasped and his eyes got all buggy again. He nodded like he understood. God, Mikey hopped he understood. He never wanted this.

“What did he say to you? What the fuck did Bryar say?”. Frank pursed his lips and his hands fell on his hips. 

Mikey smiled a sad little smile at Frank before shaking his head. He rubbed his neck sheepishly. “It’s not… it’s not Bryar. He has the accumulation of about twelve brain cells”. Frank giggled a little, he never liked Bob. “It’s Bert who is the brain. He’s the brain, Bryar is the muscles. Bert, he… He’s a real dick”. 

Frank had sat down at the kitchen table. He beckoned for Mikey to sit as well. “What did he say, Mikey?”, Frank asked, concerned but with anger. Mikey knew the anger wasn’t directed at him. Frank was pissed at something else.

“He said he was gonna get Bob to beat the shit out of me if I stopped pushing at school”, Mikey started while making his way to the table. “ But that’s not why I’m trying to hop town. He fucking threated print pictures of Pete and I. He had a bunch of them in his draw. He said he was gonna leave them all over the school if I didn’t leave. You know how people are around here, they talk, and they hurt you. I don’t give a shit about what people do to me, it’s Pete that I’m scared of. We’d both get expelled if Bert put those pictures out. I personally wanted to graduate highschool and I know that Pete really wanted his diploma. He was so proud of it, he didn’t think he was gonna make it this far. I’m not gonna let my dumbass be the reason he can’t graduate. My plan is too wait until graduation and get the fuck out. Bert can’t get to me if I’m miles away. If I stay, he’s just going to make me do more shit, he’s smart, he’ll find a way to trap me. So yeah, I’m saving up to get the fuck out”. Mikey sighed and rested his head on his hands. “I just want everyone to be happy… and safe. I should have listened to you all those months ago”.

“Hey”, Frank said. He looked real sad. His eyes were puppy-eyed and he looked like he really felt for Mikey. “We are gonna get you out of this mess. Bert likes to think he’s all that, but he’s really just a meth head who needs a few bucks. We can get around him. Plus, do you really think you leaving is going to cool shit over here? Bert’s just gonna start shit here. He’ll send those pictures anyway just to screw over what little chance Pete has to get into college or get a job. He’ll probably get Bob to beat Pete and I up, trying to find out where you are since he’ll be pissed. He probably won’t do anything to Gee though, deep down I think he loves him, maybe not romantically, but just loves him. Like I love you, even when you are a massive dick I’ll be here for you. You’re my best friend. And we are gonna get through this”.

Frank stood up and walked up to Mikey. He awkwardly hugged him even though Mikey was sitting. Mikey leaned it to it, glad to have his friend back. Frank sniffled before pulling back abruptly. He turned to the stove and saw the charged pancake.  
“Shit”, he cursed while running to the pan. “Look, Mikey. My mom’s working late tonight. Wanna swing by, we can have a few beers and figure this shit out”.

Mikey nooded even though Frank couldn’t see him. “I can bring some takeout”, Mikey offered. He could see Frank’s ears tip up, which meant he was smiling.

“Okay, just remember to get the tofu shit”.


	32. Hang In There

“So like… you can’t just turn him into the cops?”, Frank casually asked through a mouth full of Tofu.

Mikey sighed, it wasn’t that simple. “I don’t want to screw him over, I just wanna get out”. 

Frank nodded. He broke apart one of the wooden chopsticks that the Chinese takeout places give out. He stared at them idly as if pondering a hidden meaning behind them. He then laced them through his fingers and attempted to pick up food with it from his plate. Mikey watched as the sticks fell in between Frank’s fingers foolishly. Frank sighed and stabbed the tofu, giving up on figuring out how to use the sticks.

“What if he’s just like… lost?”, Frank offered, eating off his newly made tofu kabob. Mikey raised his eyebrows at Frank and took another sip of beer, guestering for him to continue. “Like what if we tried to talk him into rehab. I mean, I’m pretty sure Bert’s just selling drugs to get money to buy drugs. I doubt there are any actual higher ups, it’s just people threatening to kick Bert’s ass since he’s doing a shit ton of their drugs. Let’s just talk to him.”

Mikey nodded. Maybe this could work. Maybe they could get Bert the help he needed. They had nothing to lose.

“Let’s do it”.

***

Bert’s place still looked like absolute shit when they got there. Nobody had answered, so Mikey and Frank let themselves in. Chairs were thrown around and Frank stepped on a bottle, smashing it into pieces.

“Shit”, Frank cursed. Mikey turned to Frank sharply and pressed his finger up against his lips, hushing him. Frank went wide eyed and nodded, understanding that they had to be quiet. This was Bert’s home after all. Bert was a small man, but he could sure get rowdy when he wanted to. 

Mikey watched as Frank took up the room and frowned. His hazel eyes dropped and twinkle with soft droplets. 

“He lives like this?”, Frank whispered. It was obvious Frank was pitying Bert. Mikey might have pitied Bert to if Bert hadn’t said all those things to him and threatened him. Instead of saying something nasty back, Mikey just shrugged. 

“Let’s check the rooms and if he’s not here we can just take the pictures, find his camera, and get the fuck out”, Mikey instructed. It seemed like a good idea. They could just get anything incriminating and leave. That would provide Mikey with an easy out. Frank seemed to agree. He nodded and flashed Mikey a small smile and they moved down into the hallways. 

“In here”, Mikey pointed to the door that he knew was Bert’s. He slid his hand over the handle and slowly krept open the door. He wrinkled his nose as he was immediately hit with the stench of puke. Gross. Bert probably got drunk off his ass and threw up all over the place.

When Mikey fully opened the door, he was hit with the full stench of vomit and the sight of Bert hunched over his twin bed, his eyes fluttering. His lips were bluer than the ocean and he sounded like he was snoring even though he was perfectly awake.

“Bert?”, Mikey blubbered. Bert didn’t respond, or atleast coherently. Instead, he just mumbled something that Mikey couldn’t decipher. Mikey didn’t know what was going on or what was happening. 

“Frank?”, he panicked. “Frank, I need you to come here”.

Frank appeared behind Mikey quickly. “Shit, he cursed under his breath. “Mikey, I uh-- I think he’s over dosing. You gotta-- lemme check if there’s a phone in here. Shit”. Frank hurried off into the living room, calling for an ambulance.

Mikey gulped. He didn’t like Bert, but he certainly didn’t want Bert to die. Nobody deserved to die like that. Gerard would be torn up if Bert died shortly after their breakup.

“Hang in there, Bert”.


	33. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOD!!!!!! I'M DONE! IT'S BEEN SO MUCH FUN WRITING THIS!
> 
> I wanna thank everybody who took the time to read this. My writing has fallen though and been weak at times, so I thank you so much for sticking through it. I feel so weird, finishing my first big project. 44k+ words! Thank you so much. 
> 
> Also, I'm interested in starting up a new series or continuing my previous ones, so please give me some recommendations. Also, if you are interested on working on something together, please contact me [ here ](https://igeomwoyaaa.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Good Bye!!!

A Month Later

“Pass the Coke?”, Gerard asked. The table was filled to the brim with plates, cups, and bowls of various fruits. There was barely any space for the giant Coke bottle that Frank picked up and placed down next to Gerard’s cup. Frank winked as he took the cap of the bottle and poured a cup for Gerard. Gerard smiled and winked back, making Mikey gag. Frank and Gerard had been giving eachother little winks and playing footsie ever since they got together a month ago. It was driving Mikey up a wall. 

“Something wrong, Mikey?”, his mother asked from the other end of the table. She was sitting with Ms.Iero and they were talking about what Mikey chalked up to old lady talk. Mikey bit his tongue and shook his head. His mother wasn’t aware of Gerard and Frank and they boys meant to keep it like that until Frank turned eighteen. 

“Just bit my tongue”, Mikey explained with a shy smile. He decided to advert his mother’s side glance by taking a piece of watermelon off Pete’s plate and shoving into his mouth. 

“Hey”, Pete whined in protest. Mikey just shrugged in response. “You’re lucky you’re cute, cause if you weren’t--”

“What are you gonna do, fight him? You’d need a step stool for that”, a goofy voice that Mikey recognised as Gabe interrupted. Gabe and Alicia walked into the room, holding boxes of Pizza. 

“Hey guys,” Alicia greeted as she placed the boxes at the edge of the table. 

“Oh, you guys are so sweet”, Ms.Way cooed. “Can I at least pay for half of the pizzas? I don’t want to rob you kids”.

“It’s okay, Ms.Way. Gabe and I work at Pizza Hut so we get the pizzas dirt cheap”, Alicia chirped, flashing one of her smiles that made Mikey fall for her back in freshman year. Mikey was glad that he no longer felt a tug at his heart when she smiled like that anymore. They were perfectly fine being friends. He had Pete.

Gabe made an odd noise that Mikey assumed was in agreement. “Yeah. consider it an apology for all the times we got Mikey in trouble in highschool”, Gabe added with a (non-suggestive) wink. Ms.Way just laughed.

“Well, I don’t think Mikey needed much pressure, now did he?”, she asked.

“No, I actually don’t think he needed any”, Alicia answered with a big smile. 

“Oh, well then, I guess I’ll get everybody a pizza then. Gerard, do you know if your friend Bert is stopping by?”, Ms.Way asked. 

Gerard cringed and gave Mikey a half apologetic look. “Me and Bert aren’t friends anymore. Plus, he’s in New York right now for rehab”, Gerard awkwardly explained. Luckily, nobody decided to say anything and Ms.Way just clicked her tongue before shrugging. “Ray Toro’s gonna stop by letter after he gets off from work”, Gerard offered more chipper.

“Oh, great! You know how much I love Ray. You call the gas station and tell him to invite his mother too. Me and Linda are gonna get bored once you all go off doing whatever you teenagers do”. She flipped the lid of one of the boxes and slid a slice out onto a plate. She passed the plate to Gabe, who passed the plate down to Pete, who passed the plate down and so on. Once everyone got their plate, Ms.Way smiled.

“I’m so proud of you all, I can’t believe you all graduated! I remember you all when you were just kids in junior high. I'm also so proud of Gerard for deciding to go back to school next semester. Now, I’m not gonna go off on a speech. All I want to say is; Congratulations!”.

Some people whooped and some people clapped, but everyone smiled. Mikey smiled so wide that he felt his lips get weak. For the first time in a long time, he felt like everything was gonna be okay.


End file.
